December 24, 2007

Abstract: (Angus Reid Global Monitor) - Most adults in the United States believe the people who are defaulting on their mortgages are responsible for their woes, according to a poll by Opinion Research Corporation released by CNN. 51 per cent of respondents think they willingly entered into those agreements.

(Angus Reid Global Monitor) - Most adults in the United States believe the people who are defaulting on their mortgages are responsible for their woes, according to a poll by Opinion Research Corporation released by CNN. 51 per cent of respondents think they willingly entered into those agreements.

Conversely, 46 per cent of respondents believe the people who cannot pay their low-rate loans are the victims of bad lending policies by the banks who provided mortgages to them.

This year, defaults on so-called subprime mortgages—credit given to high-risk borrowers—have caused volatility in domestic and financial markets and raised concerns that the U.S. economy could fall into a recession.

On Aug. 31, U.S. president George W. Bush refuted calls for government intervention in favour of affected homeowners, saying, "The government’s got a role to play. But it is limited. A federal bailout of lenders would only encourage a recurrence of the problem."

On Sept. 18, the U.S. Federal Reserve announced that interest rates in the U.S. would be cut by half a percentage point.

On Dec. 17, the National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo index of builder confidence revealed no change for the last month of the year, suggesting that the U.S. housing crisis will continue into 2007. Douglas Smith, chief economist for the Americas at Standard Chartered Bank in New York, declared: "There are not a lot of incentives for homebuilders to improve their outlook. (...) In the near term, we shouldn’t have a lot of high hopes."

Polling Data

Which of the following statements comes closer to your view of those people who are now defaulting on mortgages? "You think they are the victims of bad lending policies by the banks who provided mortgages to them," or "You feel sorry for them, but they willingly entered into those agreements and have no one to blame but themselves."

No one to blame but themselves	51%
Victims of bad lending policies	46%
Unsure	4%

Source: Opinion Research Corporation / CNN
Methodology: Telephone interviews with 1,024 American adults, conducted from Dec. 6 to Dec. 9, 2007. Margin of error is 3 per cent.