The author claims that 30 year mortgages are a "scam" like student loans. Student loans are a scam because they are not dischargeable even in bankruptcy proceedings; this distorts the true cost of student loans. They are financial millstone for life. Meanwhile, with a mortgage, the worst that can happen is Chapter 7 liquidation. You lose the house but are no longer liable.
That doesn't make them a scam. These loans are highly unnatural and issued to young people with no credit history and no definite plan to ever repay. If you let people go bankrupt on them, they would max the loans out and default almost immediately.
>Meanwhile, with a mortgage, the worst that can happen is Chapter 7 liquidation. You lose the house but are no longer liable.
That is the worst that can happen for a borrower IF they qualify for Chapter 7. These loan defaults are damaging to society as well. Even when the banks get the houses back, they lose at least tens of thousands on each one in the process of selling them.