Some have been forced out of their homes. Some are falling behind on their mortgages. Some are sick of scrambling to pay down the overinflated price tag of a home that they know will continue losing value. Remember: the bubble popped by DESIGN.
Meanwhile, Wall Street is paying it's minions all-time-record wages to the tune of $140 billion in 2010. Mind you, this is just the money on the books: I'm sure additional perks and bonuses numbering in the big billions are also being "rewarded" for their hard work in bankrupting the rest of Our Nation.
Frankly, I'm disgusted by people who overextended themselves on a massive mortgage, refinanced to buy a bunch of crap, and, generally, embodied the CONSUMERISM that puts us at odds with the natural world. BUT I'm even more disgusted by the people who put that system in place, promoted it, perpetuated it, manipulated it, and are now profiting from its collapse.
Bottom line: poor people need homes more than bailed-out banks need additional assets.
Our economic system is inherently flawed and utterly screwed, so we're being forced into the massive change currently taking place. Instead of fighting over what's whose it makes a hell of a lot more sense to acknowledge our flaws and fix them. What flaws?
1. INFINITE GROWTH is a stupid and impossible goal. Planet Earth can't handle such a fundamental idiocy at the root of several billion peoples' dysfunctional lifestyles.
2. "CREATING JOBS" for it's own sake is counterproductive because most jobs are frivolous, wasteful, and -- on a planetary scale -- destructive. 90+% of real work is done by computers, machines, and dirt poor people half the world away: it's amazing US unemployment is ONLY around ~15%.
People shouldn't have to work 40+ hours a week doing something they know is pointless just to maintain the fiction of earning one's keep. Let's use our technology and creativity to LIBERATE people instead of chaining them to jobs. Personally, I think we should have a work for one year, then take four years off based economy.
Let's acknowledge that labor-saving technology eliminates jobs. Pay people to NOT have children. Pay people to NOT drive cars. Make sustainable living FREE so people's natural tendency is to embrace it. Otherwise, we'll keep banging our heads against Mother Nature's wall... until it cracks all of our skulls.
3. Ancient prophecy has no control over what we do right now. This needn't be the end of the world. We can use this situation to foster a new awareness. What awareness is that:
GREED isn't GOOD. SUSTAINABLE LAZINESS is. Do less. Buy less. Waste less. Be more.
4. GOVERNMENT and BIG BUSINESS can't be in bed together. They need to be equally powerful and at odds to assure that the little guy (and the Planet) don't get screwed.
In case you're still in denial, you're being screwed right now. Me too. And future generations? We're all screwing them together.
Accept the fact that the whole system is SCREWY. Support the people who have the courage to stand up against it.