Predatory and Discriminatory Lending

Articles and Links

The following is a list of sites, links, and articles compiled by Justin Elardo of the Union for Radical Political Economics (URPE), with the help of folks from URPE's email list. Let us know if we've left out any key articles, links, or resources.

• Dollars & Sense, the 34-year-old magazine of left economic analysis, has covered predatory lending extensively over the years; check out recent issues of the magazine for more on the subprime and credit crises.
  
  • Update on Mortgage Lending Discrimination, by Jim Campen
  • The Homeownership Myth, by Howard Karger
  • America's Growing Fringe Economy, by Howard Karger
  • Predatory Lending, by Jeanette Bradley and Peter Skillern
  • Various postings from the D&S blog


• Center for Responsible Lending is "a nonprofit, nonpartisan research and policy organization dedicated to protecting homeownership and family wealth by working to eliminate abusive financial practices." Here are just a few of their publications on predatory and discriminatory lending:
  
  • A Snapshot of the Subprime Market
  • Subprime Spillover
  • The Impact of Court-Supervised Modifications on Subprime Foreclosures


• The Levy Institute is a non-partisan public policy research organization based at Bard College that "encourages diversity of opinion in the examination of economic policy issues while striving to transform ideological arguments into informed debate." Among their publications on this topic:
  
  • Lessons from the Subprime Meltdown, by Randy Wray
  • Minsky's Cushions of Safety, by Jan Kregel
  • The U.S. Credit Crunch of 2007, by Charles J. Whalen


• Monthly Review, the classic and outstanding "independent socialist magazine," has run a number of articles relevant to the current economic crises and their origins in shady lending practices:
  
  • The Rating Horrors and Capitalist "Efficiency", by Rick Wolf
  • As Rome Burned, the Emperor Fiddled, by Rick Wolff
  • The Household Debt Bubble, by John Bellamy Foster


• United for a Fair Economy is a popular economics organization dedicated to informing people about the effects of inequality on society. They are also D&S's next-door neighbors. Here are two excellent reports they have released recently:
  
  • King's Dream Deferred: One More Victim of the Subprime Mortgage Crisis
  • Foreclosed: State of the Dream 2008


• Democracy Now is "a national, daily, independent, award-winning news program hosted by journalists Amy Goodman and Juan Gonzalez." Here is some of their recent coverage of the subprime crisis:
  
  • Minorities Hit Hardest by Subprime Mortgage Crisis
  • Subprime Lending Crisis: Millions of Families Face Losing Their Homes to Foreclosure


• Global Macroscope is a news outlet (including news feeds and blogs) that provides a progressive take on the world economic news.
  • Hard Times and Easy Money, by Max Wolff


• Americans for Fairness in Lending "exists to raise awareness of abusive credit and lending practices and to call for re-regulation of the industry." It is headed by D&S Associate and frequent author Jim Campen. Check out this video of Jim on Fox Business News. He faces down the hosts quite well.


• subPrimer.org is a blog that provides "critical context on the subprime/mortgage crisis and rapidly declining conditions in global financial markets, with a special focus on Wall Street's role in bringing about these circumstances." A highlight is the following report:
  • Wall Street and the Making of the Subprime Disaster


• Predatory Lending Association: This is a satirical site, but a total hoot.

Have a link you think we should include here? .