[lbo-talk] USA's downward spiral

[Jim Devine]

>Richard A. Easterlin, an economic historian at the University of Southern
California, has a different take. Satisfaction is always relative, he says.
If a family's debt rises, that is not a negative as long as other people's
debt is increasing at roughly the same pace.<

the problem, of course, is that bankers don't see it that way (except,
perhaps, in the short run). They instead look at the ratio of debt
service to debt of each individual, no matter what others are doing.

People aren't really individualists, but bankers treat them as
individuals (individual cash cows). If you don't pay your debts, it
really doesn't matter what others are doing.

JD