Occupy Wall Street protesters appear to be more "well off" than they insinuate

[kenbo]

Many "Occupy Wall Street" protesters arrested in New York City "occupy" more luxurious homes than their "99 percent" rhetoric might suggest, a Daily Caller investigation has found.

For each of the 984 Occupy Wall Street protesters arrested in New York City between September 18 and October 15, police collected and filed an information sheet recording the arrestee’s name, age, sex, criminal charge, home address and — in most cases — race. The Daily Caller has obtained all of this information from a source in the New York City government.

Among addresses for which information is available, single-family homes listed on those police intake forms have a median value of $305,000 — a far higher number than the $185,400 median value of owner-occupied housing units in the United States.

Some of the homes where "Occupy" arrestees reside, viewed through Google Maps and the Multiple Listing Service real estate database, are the definition of opulence.

Using county assessors and online resources such as Zillow.com, TheDC estimated property values and rents for 87 percent of the homes and 59 percent of the apartments listed in the arrest records.

Even in the nation’s currently depressed housing market, at least 95 of the protesters’ residences are worth approximately $500,000 or more.

http://news.yahoo.com/nyc-arrest-records-many-occupy-wall-street-protesters-045625415.html

Interesting bit of info.

[20MillionDinar]

Nobody should be punished for being wealthy...

I think the "robin hood" mentality of "share the wealth" is garbage and is destructive to people and the economy. If people rely on handouts they become weak.

Capitalism is a good thing. If you are motivated, always learning, set goals, and keep focused then there is no reason why you won't be wealthy too.

This is not Wall Street's fault, it is the GOVERNMENT's! They decided to bail out major financial institutions and spend spend spend, it really is simple as that. Bad debt...

[BJinMontreal]

Nobody should be punished for being wealthy...

I think the "robin hood" mentality of "share the wealth" is garbage and is destructive to people and the economy. If people rely on handouts they become weak.

Capitalism is a good thing. If you are motivated, always learning, set goals, and keep focused then there is no reason why you won't be wealthy too.

This is not Wall Street's fault, it is the GOVERNMENT's! They decided to bail out major financial institutions and spend spend spend, it really is simple as that. Bad debt...

You do know that most of the treasury department that bailed out Wall Street are former Wall Streeters themselves and had a vested interest in the very banks they bailed out?

How close are Goldman Sachs's connections with the US treasury?

What can we make of 'two dozen' conversations between treasury secretary Henry Paulson and Goldman's Lloyd Blankfein last September during the AIG rescue?

by Andrew Clark

Just how useful are Goldman Sachs's connections in high places? To date, I've been a bit sceptical about conspiracy theorists who say the bank's glittering list of alumni in government give it a kind of golden protection. But an astonishing factoid emerged this weekend about Goldman's relationship with President Bush's treasury secretary, Henry Paulson.

Paulson's office calendar at the treasury, obtained by the New York Times through a Freedom of Information request, reveals that he spoke to Goldman's boss, Lloyd Blankfein, two dozen times during the September week in which the treasury bailed out the troubled insurer AIG. That's "far more frequently" than Paulson talked to any other Wall Street executive.

Two dozen times? That's more than three times a day. More often than I speak to the Guardian's business editor. It's more often than many courting couples communicate. It's almost stalker-like behaviour. On 17 September alone, Paulson and Blankfein apparently spoke five times.

Paulson, as we know, was Goldman Sachs's chief executive for eight years before moving into government and Goldman, as has been widely documented, was the biggest counterparty to the ill-considered financial insurance policies which drove AIG to the brink of collapse. When AIG suffered a downgrade in its credit rating, Goldman began making collateral calls on its insurance contracts which eventually totalled some $13bn (£7.8bn).

Goldman had more at stake than anybody else in seeing that AIG survived. Critics contend, although Goldman hotly rejects this, that Goldman could have crumbled if the insurer had failed to cough up its dues. There is no doubt that the treasury's decision to rescue AIG worked hugely in Goldman's favour.

Paulson's decisions last year were uneven. He helped put together a rescue takeover of Bear Stearns, then allowed Lehman Brothers to go bust. Days later, he decided that AIG needed to be propped up. There's no doubt that one of the reasons was that he feared that bankruptcy of AIG would destabilise more financial institutions. The biggest one of them was Goldman.

There was no personal financial interest for Paulson in helping Goldman. Quite rightly, he was obliged to sell his $480m (£289m) worth of Goldman stock when he joined the Bush administration in 2006. But a long period inside an organisation can give a warped perspective of its importance in the grand scheme of things. Paulson probably believed that Goldman was critical to the survival of the financial system. Others might disagree.

The number of conversations between Blankfein and Paulson raises a legitimate question over whether Goldman was afforded better access to the treasury secretary than its rivals were. Could Paulson's personal relationship with former colleagues at the bank have affected his judgment?

Goldman executives insist that, in fact, the presence of its former executives in powerful positions works against the bank. They maintain that Paulson and others were paranoid about looking as if they might be helping the bank – to the extent that the treasury rejected offers from Goldman to buy both Bear Stearns and another struggler, Washington Mutual, for fear of accusations of favouritism.

Paulson himself isn't saying much. In an astonishingly weak excuse for silence from a former top-level public official, Paulson's spokeswoman told the NYT that the former treasury secretary was writing his memoirs and that his publisher had "barred him from granting interviews until his manuscript was done". That's two fingers to the public.

[dinartommy]

ya right. lol

Wall Street owns the government is the point. Between Wall Street insiders and the rest of the 1% basically own the whole government and now they are buying up the judges too. Is that so hard to understand? Seems pretty simple to me. When elected officials have to keep raising money for the next election continually who do you think they go to?

The point is, we need to get money out of the election process to take back the country from the 1%.

[parmenio]

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac executives are ready to receive millions of dollars in bonus'. Here's the hipocracy..., Obama and Harry Reid have refused to deny the executives their bonus'. These agencies are filled with friends of the Democrats and Obama. Yet, they have their minions marching on Wall Street! Wow...!!!!!! what hipocracy.

[kiteman]

Many "Occupy Wall Street" protesters arrested in New York City "occupy" more luxurious homes than their "99 percent" rhetoric might suggest, a Daily Caller investigation has found.

For each of the 984 Occupy Wall Street protesters arrested in New York City between September 18 and October 15, police collected and filed an information sheet recording the arrestee’s name, age, sex, criminal charge, home address and — in most cases — race. The Daily Caller has obtained all of this information from a source in the New York City government.

Among addresses for which information is available, single-family homes listed on those police intake forms have a median value of $305,000 — a far higher number than the $185,400 median value of owner-occupied housing units in the United States.

Some of the homes where "Occupy" arrestees reside, viewed through Google Maps and the Multiple Listing Service real estate database, are the definition of opulence.

Using county assessors and online resources such as Zillow.com, TheDC estimated property values and rents for 87 percent of the homes and 59 percent of the apartments listed in the arrest records.

Even in the nation’s currently depressed housing market, at least 95 of the protesters’ residences are worth approximately $500,000 or more.

http://news.yahoo.com/nyc-arrest-records-many-occupy-wall-street-protesters-045625415.html

Interesting bit of info.

I'm shocked that the average price of these homes in NYC are above the median price of a US home. Does this report know that the average price of a home in NY automatically exceeds the median price of an owner occupied home in the US??? I did my own quick Zillow search, $185K will get you a 1 bed 1bath 700 sq ft apartment in Brooklyn and the Bronx. It'll also get you this cozy litte studio on the Upper East Side in Manhattan, a whopping 350 sq. ft.

http://www.zillow.com/homedetails/340-E-83rd-St-New-York-NY-10028/31544310_zpid/#{scid=hdp-site-map-list-photos}

Also, I'd be curious to see if they check the ownership records of the home vs. the name on the arrest form? How many of these protestors actually own the home they list as an address? Or are they living with parents or siblings? Or are they renting? Also, in the city, an 1800 rent is not that much.

Edited November 2, 2011 by kiteman

[popdango]

With all the bad conduct by banks, credit unions are a much better option for keeping your money out of the hands of the banksters. Why give your money to someone who doesn’t respect you or your financial health? See what I’m talking about at learnmore.asmarterchoice.org. There’s info about making the switch, too.

[uncirculd]

Nobody should be punished for being wealthy...

I think the "robin hood" mentality of "share the wealth" is garbage and is destructive to people and the economy. If people rely on handouts they become weak.

Capitalism is a good thing. If you are motivated, always learning, set goals, and keep focused then there is no reason why you won't be wealthy too.

This is not Wall Street's fault, it is the GOVERNMENT's! They decided to bail out major financial institutions and spend spend spend, it really is simple as that. Bad debt...

They should if they are pretending to be poor. What motivates that?

I'm shocked that the average price of these homes in NYC are above the median price of a US home. Does this report know that the average price of a home in NY automatically exceeds the median price of an owner occupied home in the US??? I did my own quick Zillow search, $185K will get you a 1 bed 1bath 700 sq ft apartment in Brooklyn and the Bronx. It'll also get you this cozy litte studio on the Upper East Side in Manhattan, a whopping 350 sq. ft.

http://www.zillow.co...ap-list-photos}

Also, I'd be curious to see if they check the ownership records of the home vs. the name on the arrest form? How many of these protestors actually own the home they list as an address? Or are they living with parents or siblings? Or are they renting? Also, in the city, an 1800 rent is not that much.

Yeah, just who are they? 1%'ers or lye er's.

Crap, gotta leave this post. It's one of those that really get me ticked and wanna sound off. Treasury, political motives, wallstreet, Fannie & Freddie, bankers bonus, yep time to go before I blow a gasket.

I will say this. Where does a board of so called intelligent folks get the audicity to vote a big bonus's to CEO's for banks that failed????

Edited November 5, 2011 by uncirculd