The NYT had a good piece today on the rapid growth in the number of people who simply turn over their homes to the bank because the mortgage exceeds the value of the home. One of the experts interviewed for the article was Nicholas P. Retsinas, director of the Joint Center for Housing Studies at Harvard University. Mr. Retsinas is perhaps best known for dismissing the idea that there could be a housing bubble and therefore low and moderate income families should not be reticent to buy homes. A couple of the pearls of wisdom that followers of Mr. Retsinas would have read are: "More importantly, it takes concentrated job losses - the likes of which have not been seen during this business cycle - to drive down home prices;" and "Moreover, when house prices deflate, they do so slowly." Readers of the NYT would benefit from having a better understanding of the background of the "experts" whose views appear in their articles. [Thanks to Ben Zipperer for retrieving these gems from the piece.]
--Dean Baker
