Well-intentioned but wrong

The two-year foreclosure moratorium in Spain sounds like a really nice, humane thing to do.

But the problem is, it just prolongs the inevitable adjustment process that the Spanish economy so desperately needs.

The easiest way to imagine it is the metaphorical pulling-off of a band-aid. You can give it one swift tug, experience a moment of sharp pain or you can pull it off slowly, agonizingly, hair by hair.

The US is the perfect example. The government has injected itself into the foreclosure process and delayed the inevitable bounce-back. Five years after the bursting of the real-estate bubble we are just experiencing the first tentative turnaround in housing.

I like my pain short and intense rather than long and drawn out…Call me a sadist. Desperate people will do desperate things no matter what the knee-jerk response. There will no doubt be other tragedies, foreclosure delay or no foreclosure delay.