Ben Stein says monetary stimulus is generating a recovery, housing is next

I wouldn't say [the recovery] has come from federal stimulus, I would say it's come from incredibly accomodative monetary policy. The next natural driver will be the consumer recovering and the consumer feeling more confident, it's already happening in autos. If someone had predicted, a year and a half ago, that the auto-business would be whirring, no one would've believed him. But, because of very accomodative credit terms at the car dealerships, the car dealership business, the car selling and making business, is booming!

I think the next stage is, if somehow the Federal Reserve can convince the banks to be accomodative about lending for housing, housing will recover. I mean, there's no reason that the banks can not get back into housing. They don't have to be as wild and crazy as they were in the late '90s and early 2000s, but they should get back into lending. And when they do, then that will recover, too, and that will be another leg of the recovery.

~Ben Stein, actor, author and economist, WSJ's Markets Hub, April 19, 2011