More to Edmund Andrews’ Story Than Meets the Eye

I noted Megan McArdle’s piece regarding New York Times reporter Edmund Andrews, and his adventures with subprime loans, the other day in a post I titled Subprime Woes Self-Inflicted, An Economic Writer’s Tale.  I did not necessarily think that Andrews’ tale was that brave, nor did I think the blame for Andrews’ financial woes should be laid at the feet of the subprime lending industry.

McArdle, as I noted in the above mentioned post, thought Andrews tale was ”...the bravest thing I’ve read for a long, long time.”

I think Megan is probably thinking a bit differently now.

At the end of his book’s harrowing account of mortgage mistakes and credit card crises,  Edmund Andrews writes:  “While our misadventure had certainly been more extreme than those of many other Americans, our situation was not all that unusual.”  And indeed the book reads like the story of an American Everyman, easily sucked in to the alluring world of easy credit as he struggled to blend a new family.  The terrifying implication is that it could happen to you—to anyone who leads with their heart and not their head.

But en route to that moral, it turns out the story has been tidied up a little.  Patty Barreiro, Andrews’ wife, has declared bankruptcy twice.  The second time was while they were married, a detail that didn’t make it into either the book or the excerpt that ran in last Sunday’s New York Times Magazine.

Good on Megan McArdle for looking further than the ink printed on NYT paper.

UPDATE (forgot to include link to McArdle’s piece): McArdle’s most recent piece on Andrews is titled The Road to Bankruptcy.

Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 05/21 at 06:31 PM

  1. Unbelievable…

    “Patty’s second bankruptcy stemmed from a loan she received from her sister, while Patty was still living in Los Angeles. At the time, she was caring for four children, working for very modest pay, and receiving almost no child support from her ex-husband. (Despite multiple court orders, he remains chronically delinquent on untold thousands of dollars.)

    When Patty couldn’t repay, her sister followed her east and sued her. I offered to pay off the loan by withdrawing money out of my 401k, but I wasn’t allowed to because the purpose didn’t qualify as a “hardship.” Without an alternative, Patty had no choice but to seek bankruptcy protection.”

    http://www.pbs.org/newshour/businessdesk/2009/05/ed-andrews-responds-to-critici.html

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)  on  05/22  at  08:26 PM

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