First published 2015
Six years after the financial meltdown, the American housing market remains broken. Bethany McLean examines the $10 trillion housing market and reveals how Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac still control the mortgages that define most Americans' financial lives. McLean traces the $188 billion government bailout of these two giants, the most expensive rescue in history, and shows why their current limbo threatens the entire system. The co-author of The Smartest Guys in the Room and All the Devils are Here argues that this situation cannot continue. She explains why housing finance remains the biggest unresolved problem from the crisis and outlines potential solutions, from ideal reforms that face political impossibility to practical fixes that come with serious trade-offs.
Genres: business, american, economics, non-fiction, 21st-century, finance
Vibes: intimate, suspenseful, thought-provoking
Tropes: investigative-journalism, social-issues
Setting: America
Period: 2008 Financial Crisis
160 pages · Paperback · Columbia Global Reports