The Two-Income Trap - Elizabeth Warren [126]
20 Calculated from Thomas A. Durkin, “Credit Cards: Use and Consumer Attitudes, 1970-2000,” Federal Reserve Bulletin 76 (September 2000): 623.
21 See Gillin, “Events Conspire Against Bankruptcy Reform.”
22 Todd Mason, “Jobless Relying on Credit Cards, Home Equity,” Philadelphia Inquirer, April 17, 2003; Manning, Credit Card Nation, pp. 4, 131.
23 Matt Olson, “Medical Debtors to the Poorhouse: Credit Card Companies Singing All the Way to the Bank,” The Progressive 5, no. 7 (July 1, 2001): 30.
24 In 1997, 61 percent of homeowners who had taken a traditional home equity loan reported that they took the loan to repay other debts, compared with just 1 percent who took the loan to pay for a vacation. Among homeowners with a line of credit (a somewhat more affluent group than those with traditional home equity loans), 49 percent took a loan to repay debts, and 13 percent did so to take a vacation. Canner, Durkin, and Luckett, “Recent Developments in Home Equity Lending,” p. 248.
25 “Lobbyists Battle Over Bankruptcy Bill,” in MSNBC.com, August 5, 2002. Available at http://www.msnbc.com/news/790231.asp#BODY [3/6/2003].
26 Among all homeowners in bankruptcy, 34 percent had either taken out a second or third mortgage or refinanced to obtain cash. Among homeowners with minor children, the figure is essentially the same, 32.4 percent.
27 Among families filing for bankruptcy, 49.7 percent reported credit card debts exceeding six months’ income. For this calculation, we excluded all families reporting no income, even though many of them were carrying large balances on their credit cards. As a result, we probably understate the magnitude of the problem facing these families.
28 “Credit card debt” or “trouble managing money” was listed by 55 percent of all the households filing for bankruptcy, but only 5.7 percent of all families, and only 3.7 percent of families with children, listed either of those reasons without also listing a job loss, a medical problem, or a family breakup as a reason for filing.
29 Judge Edith H. Jones and Todd J. Zywicki, “It’s Time for Means-Testing,” Brigham Young University Law Review (1999): 177-249.
30 In 1980, Congress passed the Depository Institutions and Monetary Control Act (DIDMCA), which phased out Regulation Q, thus allowing banks to pay higher interest to depositors. It also preempted state usury laws as they applied to deposityr institutions making loans secured by a first-lien home mortgage. After passage of the DIDMCA, the courts extended the usury law preemption to apply to non-purchase price first-lien home mortgages. Cathy Lesser Mansfield, “The Road to Subprime ‘HEL’ Was Paved with Good Congressional Intentions: Usuary Deregulation and the Subprime Home Equity Market, South Carolina Law Review 51 (Spring 2000): 473, 492-495, and 511-521
31 Fannie Mae, Becoming A Homeowner: How Much House Can You Afford? In the “Homepath” section of FannieMae.com. Available at http://www.fanniemae.com/homebuyers/findamortgage/becoming/started/houseafford.jhtml?p=Find+a+Mortgage&s=Becoming+a+Homeowner&t=Getting+Started&q=How+Much+House+Can+You+Afford? [3/2/2003].
32 U.S. Bureau of the Census, House-Poor/House-Rich, Statistical Brief (August 1991).
33 Calculated from U.S. Bureau of the Census, Annual Housing Survey for the United