Solution to the Economic Crisis: Build New Ghost Towns!

This story from today's New York Times gave me the sick feeling in my stomach that everything that I've been writing and thinking about our nation's economy and culture is sadly correct. Here we are a year or so after our country's biggest financial crisis and near depression, just barely getting on track and with unemployment still in double-digits and we have developers building NEW housing developments on top of all the empty ones! They have literally stuck their heads so far deep in the sand that they've popped out the other side and damned if things don't look rosy. There are 9,517 new houses sitting empty in Las Vegas and two million vacant homes for sale in the US. But the rub is that the economy only works through limitless expansion and consumption. New products must always be created, no matter their utility, in order to fuel GDP growth. This necessity also inheres in the American psyche. As the article makes clear: "many Americans will always believe the latest model of something is their only option, an attitude builders are doing their utmost to reinforce." Capitalist ideology hard at work! Just like we've seen after crises past, Americans are now hard at work forgetting everything and busy setting the stage for a new crisis; inflating a brand new bubble. As Brent Anderson, a marketing executive for Meritage Homes puts it in the article,“Our customers wouldn’t care if there were 50 homes in an established neighborhood of 1980 or 1990 vintage, all foreclosed, empty and for sale at $10,000 less. They want new. And what are we going to do, let someone else build it?”Of course not Brent! But, maybe you can get ghosts to start paying up for their mortgages?

Check out the story here:

Building Is Booming in a City of Empty Houses