The Contagion Expands...

One of the things that I find quite annoying is the politicization of certain macro events that I believe can not be created or contained by government policies, but merely influenced. Politicization creates a simplification of the analysis that leads to complacency under the pretense that voting the incumbents out of office will be the panacea. And the biggest economic crises of my lifetime, the current housing bubble, is the poster-child of this myopia. Failure to see the housing crises as a symptom of a much larger systemic problem leads the US to simply apply bandages to the problem; any true solution, other than the assignment or disavowal of blame, would be political suicide. Here, I would simply like to point out that the housing bubble is popping throughout the world, although not as precipitous as in the US (14.1 % in Q1 according to the Case-Shiller Index).

Irish Housing Market Continues to Slide
British house prices post biggest fall since early 1990s
Housing Woes in U.S. Spread Around Globe