But then others point out that the arrears rate on mortgages, at 60 basis points, is quite low, and that the rate of new construction of dwellings in recent years has been low relative to population needs.
In recognition of that experience, many have characterized the extraordinary rise in stock prices in the late 1990s as a bubble - a significant and protracted departure in asset prices from fundamentals - and the subsequent decline as a popping of that bubble.