Allen Gary

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//-->YOUR HOMEbyGary AllenYOUR HOMEBig Brother Wants Control Of HousingGary Allen, a graduate of Stanford Uni-versity, is the author of several best-sellingbooks, including Communist Revolution InThe Streets; Nixon's Palace Guard; NoneDare Call It Conspiracy; and, RichardNixon: The Man Behind The Mask, thedefinitive study of the ambition andconspiratorial activities of our recentPresident. Mr. Allen, a former instructor ofhistory and English, is active in numeroushumanitarian,anti-Communist,andbusiness enterprises. A film writer, author,and journalist, he is a Contributing Editorto AMERICANOPINION.■RALPHNader informs us in the April1973 issue of Saturday Review Of Society:"The housing issue is going to be in theSeventies what the auto issue was in theSixties. There is no question about it at all."Nader is doubtless right; not because hiscrystal ball has been fine-tuned by JeaneDixon, but because he is in on the game.Ralph Nader may be full of moremisinformation than Criswell, but he knowswhere the next collectivist thrust is aimedbecause he helps wield the socialist sword.And Nader is no mere sorcerer's ap-prentice. He knows exactly what hiscollectivist incantations are designed toproduce. According to the daily Australian,he told a Sydney audience on July 8, 1972:"What is needed is Socialism orCommunism of one sort or another." Mr.Nader has declined to spell out to hisAmerican audience exactly what sort of"Socialism or Communism" he has in mind,and now denies ever having made such anadmission. But in naming housing he hascertainly identified the latesttarget of those who are seeking totalcontrol over America and Americans.The concept of every family having theopportunity to own a home has been acornerstone of our national tradition sincecolonial days. Home ownership has beenbasic both to our Free Enterprise systemand family life. For generations youngfamilies have dreamed and planned andsaved to acquire their own house. But todaythose young couples are facing obstaclesthat threaten to make home ownershipimpossible for them. Propelled by inflationand the added cost of meeting requirementsimposed by environmentalists and landplanners, the price of housing is spiralingupward like a Fourth of July rocket.Millions of would-be homeowners havealready been priced out of the homemarket, and soon only the wealthy may beable to afford to purchase a new house.Not long ago, American families couldallot twenty-five percent of their income forhousing, but now the figure has escalated toover one-third. And if the planners andbureaucrats have their way the wholecharacter of our housing will soon bechanged so that the typical Americanfamily will be shoved into a high-densitydwelling in the style of the New York antheap.Principal And InterestAs higher costs of land, materials, labor,and money have been added to the cost ofconstruction delays created by thebureaucracy, housing contractors havepassed along the cost to consumers. TheNational Association of Homebuilders re-ported in Newsweek for July 29, 1974,1that the average price of a new home inAmerica is now a staggering $35,800 — upforty percent since 1969. During the pastfive years the cost of financing hasincreased one hundred percent, labor is uptwenty-one percent, materials twenty-twopercent, land fifty-nine percent, and otherrelated costs up forty-eight percent. Inshort, that dream home that you could buyfor $25,600 just five years ago is now goingto cost you $35,800 ... if you can arrange amortgage to buy it. To qualify for amortgage loan, assuming the money isavailable, a family would today have tohave an income of between fourteenthousand and sixteen thousand dollars tobuy a thirty-five thousand dollar home witha minimum down payment. The medianincome for American families of four isonly eleven thousand dollars, whichautomatically eliminates most homeseekers.Consider what this jump in price does tothe family budget. Mr. Family Man buyingthe average house five years ago with anormal twenty percent down payment andsix percent conventional loan for thirtyyears would have been making payments ofapproximately $122.92 per month principaland interest (plus his taxes and insurance).His payment for principal and interest onthe same house today is going to run about$255 per month. Under the conditions nowprevailing, a family must borrow at leasteight thousand dollars more than it wouldhave had to borrow five years ago, and mustalso pay nearly double the interest rate. Thatextra eight thousand dollars at today'sinterest rate of 11.25 percent is going to costapproximately seventy dollars per month forrepayment of principal and interest, or$25,275.60 more for thirty years.To put a down payment on the averagehome five years ago, you would have had toscrape together a little over five thousanddollars. Today, you must come up withapproximately seventy-two hundred dollars- almost fifty percent more2cash. And, as nearly everyone who has everbought a home knows, coming up with thatcash down payment is very painfulbusiness.The purchaser of our typical home offive years ago would pay a total ofapproximately $44,251.20, principal andinterest, over the life of his thirty-year loan.Today's buyer will pay an incredible totalof approximately $91,000, or a differenceof $47,548.80. Oh, what a friend we have inBig Brother!Many families may choose to forego thecurrent purchase of their mini-castle in thebelief that the inflation we are suffering isbut a temporary aberration. We hate tobreak the news to them, but the factorswhich have added ten thousand dollars ontothe cost of the average home are beingmade worse by the government, not better.The future holds more inflation, moregovernment distortions of the moneymarkets, and more bureaucratic planning.Business Week of July 13, 1974, reports:"Last year's $24,000 home will sell for$27,500 this year .... last year's $30,000home is now $33,000." Maurice Mann,president of the Federal Home Loan Bank ofSan Francisco, says: "It's safe to assume thatthe cost of housing is rising 15% to 20% thisyear - but don't hang your hat on 20%."Strangely enough, the skyrocketing cost ofhousing is being held down somewhat bythe lack of available mortgage money! TheWall Street Journal of October 11, 1974,notes that many builders are now rentingtheir new houses and waiting for greateravailability of mortgage funds before sellingthem. The Journal quotes builder Edward H.Kuykendall as declaring: "We feel that whysweat it with the buyer now. When the[mortgage] market eases up, prices will goup 20% easily."Terrific.Chief cause of the current high interestand general mess in housing is inflation.That is, deficit spending by government.The public has been convinced by theLaurance Rockefeller, using his vast "metro" complex at 1313 East Sixtieth Street in Chicago,and operating through his Independent Task Force on Land Use, laid the groundwork forfederal control of all land development. Legislation was quickly proposed to require the statesto draw up comprehensive plans for control of all private land holdings. Federal funds wouldbe denied any state which refused to follow federal "guidelines." The bill was narrowlydefeated this year, but the Rockefeller "metro" agencies pressedRussell Train of the E.P.A. toinstitute federal "land control"through an administrative orderrequiring federal approval ofland development. Train is aformer Rockefeller employee.The game has been to create se-vere problems for the privatehousing industry to justifygovernment control of housing.A 278-page government report,The Costs Of Sprawl, has justbeen issued to explain why BigBrother must put an end to thebuildingofsingle-familyhomes in America.3machines of mass misinformation thatinflation is synonymous with rising prices.Your dictionary will tell you that inflation isan increase in the supply of money, and anyhonest economist can explain that it is thenew printing-press money (currency anddeficit) sloshing through the economywhich bids up prices by reducing the valueof all money already in circulation. Onlygovernment can do this. During the NixonAdministration the supply of money was in-creased (inflated) by over fifty percent topay for unprecedented deficits. All of thisnew money caused a myriad of seriousdistortions in our economy, and the housingmarket has been most keenly affected.One of the major distortions was toinduce people to remove their money fromsavings and loan associations, which wouldnormally lend it for housing, and to place itinstead in government securities to gethigher interest rates. The industry has adollar word for this phenomenon. They callit "disintermedia-tion." During July, fivehundred million dollars were removed fromthe savings and loan associations, and thefollowing month $1.2 billion was withdrawn.Large depositors have been extracting theirfunds from the savings associations becausethe government will not allow suchinstitutions to compete equitably withinterest offered on the government's owntreasury bills. It is a purposeful effort todrive the savings and loan institutions to thewall as a means of obtaining federal controlof the mortgage market. The Wall StreetJournal of September 27, 1974, reports:Currently, thrift institutions areprohibited by regulation from payingmore than 5 1/2% to 7 1/2% annualinterest on various types of savingsaccounts. With interest rates in themoney market rising sharply in recentyears, individuals seeking the bestpossible returns have beenbypassing or pulling out of the thriftinstitutions and putting their fundsdirectly into bonds and other types ofdebt instruments.After all, why should a saver take 5.25percent interest from a savings and loanwhen he can get almost double that fromgovernment bonds? Which is why, sinceJuly 1973, over four billion dollars havebeen pulled out of these associations. Butwhen there is no money in the savings andloan institutions they cannot make loans toprospective home builders and buyers.When that happens, the federal Dracula hasits fangs in the life blood of the homeindustry, the housing market dies, andeveryone starts calling on Big Brother to dosomething.At the heart of the problem is the factthat, during the six-year Administration ofPresident Richard Nixon, the federalgovernment somehow managed to spendone hundred billion dollars more than itsqueezed from us in taxes. When thegovernment spends more money than ittakes in it has only two sources of makingup the difference. It may borrow the moneyor print it. When the government prints themoney through the Federal Reserve System,and distributes it through the economy, ittriggers the wage-price spiral which thecommentators call inflation. The federatessoon hear the groans of the people, butinstead of putting a halt to deficit spendingthey slow the presses and go out into themoney markets (the capital markets) andborrow the billions they need to pay thegovernment's deficit bills - pulling moneyout of the private sector to spend onsocialism.* The result is that privateenterprise is deprived of capital and stag-nates while government gets bigger andbigger. If spending is not slowed and theprinting presses continue to grind out thedeficit currency at the same time, we find*The government is not, of course, handicapped by theinterest ceilings it imposes on many of the other biddersfor the saver's dollar.4 [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]