"My personal observations during my daily trek through the slums of West Philly [confirm] the oligarch scheme to create an artificial auto recovery by distributing auto loans to deadbeats, the SNAP army, and hip hop nitwits. As I maneuver quickly through the West Philly badlands...I see an inordinate number of brand new BMWs, Mercedes, Lexus, Cadillacs, and Jaguars parked in front of $20,000 dilapidated fleapits...

The real unemployment rate in these garbage strewn, disintegrating neighborhoods exceeds 50%. The median household income is less than $20,000. Over 40% of the adult population hasn't graduated high school and 63% of the population lives below the poverty level. These people put the "sub" in subprime. How can anyone in this American version of the third world afford to drive a $40,000 vehicle? The answer is they can't. But you the taxpayer, out of the goodness of your heart and without your knowledge, have loaned them the money so they can cruise around West Philly in Jay Z or Kanye style... Maybe the West Philly subprime Mercedes drivers can trade their SNAP (EBT) cards for cash to make their car loan payments...

When 'the Man' offered to loan them $300,000 in 2005 so they could buy their very own McMansion, what did they have to lose? They got to live in a fancy house for a few years until they were booted out by the bank and left in exactly the same spot they were before... Now 'the Man' has knocked on their hovel door again and offered to put them in a brand spanking new Cadillac Escalade with no money down, no proof of employment, and no prospects of repaying the loan... They get to tool around West Philly for a year or two impressing their fellow SNAP recipients until the repo man shows up and absconds with their wheels..."

-- Jim Quinn article