Economic meltdown - the USA and Canada

Very interesting side-by-side look at Canadian finances with USA finances. From Mark Perry at The American:

Due North: Canada�s Marvelous Mortgage and Banking System
What about the Canadian banking system allowed it to survive the recent worldwide slowdown without a single bank failure? What can the United States learn from Canada about sound banking?

There were some significant differences between Canada and the United States during the recent financial crisis. In general, Canada�s banking system proved more prudent, more resilient, and much less prone to excesses. Taking a closer look at these differences might tell us how the United States got into the mess it is in, and illuminate some ideas for future reforms.

Mark then shows some very interesting data and continues:

And this recent financial crisis isn�t the first time that Canada�s banking system showed greater signs of stability and less exposure to stress than U.S. banks. In the 1930s, when 9,000 U.S. banks failed during the Great Depression, not a single bank in Canada failed. When almost 3,000 American banks failed during the Savings and Loan (S&L) Crisis, only two small Canadian banks failed in 1985, and those were the first bank failures in Canada since 1923. And while almost 200 U.S. banks have failed since the start of the global recession in early 2008, Canada remains the only industrialized country in the world that has survived the last two years of financial and economic stress without a single bank failure.

What about the Canadian banking system allowed it to survive the recent worldwide slowdown, and even the Great Depression, without a single bank failure, and what can the United States learn from Canada about sound banking? Below is a summary of some of the distinctly different features of Canada�s banks and mortgage markets discussed at the AEI seminar, which help explain the greater financial stress resiliency of Canadian banks compared to American banks.

1. Full Recourse Mortgages in Canada. Almost all Canadian mortgages are �full recourse� loans, meaning that the borrower remains fully responsible for the mortgage even in the case of foreclosure. If a bank in Canada forecloses on a home with negative equity, it can file a deficiency judgment against the borrower, which allows it to attach the borrower�s other assets and even take legal action to garnish the borrower�s future wages. In the United States, we have a mix of recourse and non-recourse laws that vary by state, but even in recourse states, the use of deficiency judgments to attach assets and garnish wages is infrequent. The full recourse feature of Canadian mortgages results in more responsible borrowing, fewer delinquencies, and significantly fewer foreclosures than in the United States.

Mark goes on to list seven other differences -- getting these implemented would be like pulling teeth without Novocaine as our current crop of bankers like the risk and money that can be made when playing with other people's money. You always have the option of pulling your money out of these banks and moving to a more prudent institution. Our personal and business accounts are at a local Credit Union and we are very happy with them.