The fallacy of a pain-free path to a healthy housing market

In the mid-1990s, the public policy goal of increasing the U.S. homeownership rate collided with a huge leap in financial innovation. Lenders shifted from originating and holding mortgages to originating and packaging them for sale to investors. These new financial products enabled millions of Americans who hadn’t previously qualified to buy a home to become owners. Housing construction boomed, reaching a postwar high—9.1 million homes were built between 2002 and 2006, a period when 5.6 million U.S. households were formed. ; The resulting oversupply of homes presents policymakers with a formidable challenge as they struggle to craft a sustainable economic recovery. Usually a driver of economic recoveries, the housing market is foundering as an engine of growth. ; Generations of policymakers since the 1930s have sought to increase the homeownership rate. By the late 1960s, it had reached 64.3 percent of households, remaining there through the mid-1990s, in apparent equilibrium with household formation during a period of sustained U.S. economic growth. A fresh push to increase ownership drove the rate up 5 percentage points to its peak in the mid-2000s. Home price gains followed the rate upward.Mortgage loans ; Construction industry ; Housing - Prices

Recovering from the housing and financial crisis

The recent recession was unusual because it stemmed from an unsustainable easing of credit standards and financing, which fueled the prior expansion but also the imbalances that led to the worst recession since the 1930s. When losses on new financial practices ended excessive lending, the economy was hit by housing and credit shocks, culminating in a financial crisis. Home construction plunged, wealth fell, credit standards tightened and financial markets seized up. ; The initial impacts of these four shocks on gross domestic product (GDP) were amplified by cyclical interactions between income and spending. Since the second half of 2009, these negative shocks have been unwinding, setting the stage for economic recovery. An analysis of the shocks and their aftermath offers clues to the direction and pace of the recovery.Global financial crisis ; Construction industry ; Housing - Prices ; Mortgage loans ; Credit ; Securities

When will the U.S. housing market stabilize?

The hope that housing markets had stabilized in mid-2010 was dashed by subsequent declines in home construction and prices (Charts 1 and 2). Homebuilding peaked about five years ago, and housing prices almost four years ago. Amid such a prolonged downturn, a key question becomes, When will the housing market stabilize and support the economic recovery? We suggest that new home construction may stabilize and start recovering slowly within the next year or so. Our econometric results also indicate that national house prices may hit bottom late this year or in early 2012 and then recover slowly.Housing - Prices ; Mortgage loans

A Place to be Together:: Cultivating Spaces of Discomfort and Not Knowing in Visual Analysis. The Collaborative Seeing Studio.

This article describes our transmethodological practice and the affective space of making and making sense of visual research in community. We purposefully embrace complexity and richness in visual data analysis, rather than seeking to reductively avoid doubt and uncertainty. To do this, we bring multiple ways of seeing together into a collaborative, poly-vocal construction. Our ‘studio’ is designed to be a safe space for risk and creativity. We are at different levels of experience and confidence, but we all learn from each other. Seeing collaboratively depends on translating our ways of reading visual material “out of our heads” and “into our shared space.” In the sense that we love what we are doing, we revel at opening ourselves to new possibilities. In-Progress: Victoria Restler Narrates a Collaborative Seeing Studio Session. Wendy Luttrell leads us into collaging as both metaphor and tools of Collaborative Seeing. We end with a brief reflection

Proline-rich tyrosine kinase 2 mediates gonadotropin-releasing hormone signaling to a specific extracellularly regulated kinase-sensitive transcriptional locus in the luteinizing hormone beta-subunit gene

G protein-coupled receptor regulation of gene transcription primarily occurs through the phosphorylation of transcription factors by MAPKs. This requires transduction of an activating signal via scaffold proteins that can ultimately determine the outcome by binding signaling kinases and adapter proteins with effects on the target transcription factor and locus of activation. By investigating these mechanisms, we have elucidated how pituitary gonadotrope cells decode an input GnRH signal into coherent transcriptional output from the LH β-subunit gene promoter. We show that GnRH activates c-Src and multiple members of the MAPK family, c-Jun NH(2)-terminal kinase 1/2, p38MAPK, and ERK1/2. Using dominant-negative point mutations and chemical inhibitors, we identified that calcium-dependent proline-rich tyrosine kinase 2 specifically acts as a scaffold for a focal adhesion/cytoskeleton-dependent complex comprised of c-Src, Grb2, and mSos that translocates an ERK-activating signal to the nucleus. The locus of action of ERK was specifically mapped to early growth response-1 (Egr-1) DNA binding sites within the LH β-subunit gene proximal promoter, which was also activated by p38MAPK, but not c-Jun NH(2)-terminal kinase 1/2. Egr-1 was confirmed as the transcription factor target of ERK and p38MAPK by blockade of protein expression, transcriptional activity, and DNA binding. We have identified a novel GnRH-activated proline-rich tyrosine kinase 2-dependent ERK-mediated signal transduction pathway that specifically regulates Egr-1 activation of the LH β-subunit proximal gene promoter, and thus provide insight into the molecular mechanisms required for differential regulation of gonadotropin gene expression

Illinois State University University Band Symphonic Band

Center for the Performing Arts Wednesday Evening April 23, 2003 8:00p.m

British Band Classics Wind Symphony

Center for the Performing Arts Sunday Afternoon November 17, 2002 3:00p.m

Ridge Propagation and the Stability of Small Mid-Ocean Ridge Offsets

The mid-ocean ridge system comprises a series of spreading ridges, transform faults, propagating ridges, and other non-transform offsets. Transform faults remain stable for millions of years leaving long linear scars, or fracture zones, on older seafloor. Propagating ridges migrate in the ridge parallel direction leaving V-shaped or W-shaped scars on older seafloor. Vertical gravity gradient maps can now resolve the details of the ridge segmentation. For slow- and intermediate-spreading ridges, there appears to be an offset length threshold above which adjacent ridges do not propagate so remain as stable transform faults. We propose this threshold is due to the yield strength of the lithosphere, and we develop a model framework based on a force balance wherein forces driving propagation must exceed the integrated shear strength of the offset zone. We apply this model framework to 5 major propagating ridges, 55 seesaw propagating ridges, and 69 transform faults. The model correctly predicts the migration of 4 out of 5 major propagating ridges and the stability of transform faults, but the results for seesaw propagators are less accurate. Model predictions for direction of ridge propagation are mixed as well. This model framework simplifies deformation in the shear zone, but can possibly explain why non-transform deformation is preferred at short offsets