The National Association of Realtors (NAR), which pushed Congress to give FHA yet more responsibilities, is now trying to show that the agency is not really insolvent. But the slippery "facts" they are using show how tenuous their argument is.

Few recognize just how troubled this government agency really is. When measured against the accounting system used by private mortgage insurers, the FHA is deeply insolvent, with a capital shortfall of tens of billions of dollars. If it were a private firm, state regulators would immediately shut it down. 

Proposals to increase the conforming loan limit are really proposals to take more of these benefits away from the people who actually need the help and give it to people who do not.

No serious observer of the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) believes its financial future is bright. But few recognize just how troubled this government agency really is.

To make financial markets less vulnerable to their inevitable cycles, it is an essential responsibility of both private financial actors and government officials to study, develop and implement countercyclical approaches.

Banks trying to prevent Wal-Mart from entering their businessshould tell us a lot about what the separation of banking and commerce is really about.

Although the Schumer-Lee plan deserves credit for seeking to promote international capital flows and labor mobility, it would neither make a measurable dent in the housing sector's backlog nor fix a broken immigration system that hampers our economy's long-run prospects.

In opposing Wal-Mart's application to acquire a bank-like institution in Utah, the banking industry is hurting its own prospects for growth and expansion.