" But, although Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are officially private, profit-making enterprises, their size and the federal government’s involvement in both their creation and their on-going operations led many investors to assume that the federal government would never allow them to fail—which is to say, the increasing riskiness of the assets of these two mortgage market giants was an increasing riskiness for the taxpayers, whether the taxpayers knew it or not. "

― Thomas Sowell , The Housing Boom and Bust