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Financial Crisis of 2008

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Submitted By grifter58
Words 1198
Pages 5
Eco 101.01
9:45 AM Class
30 November 2010

Special Topic 5- The Crisis of 2008: Causes and Lessons for the Future

1.) Why did housing prices rise rapidly during 2001-2005 and then fall in the years immediately following? Did regulation and monetary policy play a role in this housing boom and bust cycle?
“During the years of 2001-2005 housing prices rose due to the fact that the mortgage default rate and the foreclosure rate was at an all time low” (pg.671). The government was making new standards for housing loans and mortgages, which made them more affordable and easier to get, even if you didn’t actually meet the old standards you could still be eligible for loans and mortgages. Immediately after this housing boom, a bust arisen in the housing prices. The bust was caused because many of the monthly mortgage payments stopped coming in. This was because mortgage loans were made to more people whose chances of repaying them were less than in the past. These mistakes can simply be blamed on misjudgments by the banks and other leaders. When millions of these payments stopped coming in, there was no amount of financial expertise on Wall Street or government help that could save the whole investment structure built on the foundation of those mortgage payments. Government regulation and monetary policy played a significant role in the housing boom and bust cycle because government regulations and interventions are precisely what pushed lending institutions to reduce the standards which they had traditionally required of prospective borrowers before making mortgage loans to them. This lowering of mortgage loan standards, and the riskier loans that resulted, were crucial to the bust and caused the American economy to collapse, which in turn was felt internationally.

2.) What caused the crisis of 2008? Was it mortgage lending standards and the broader issue of

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