I’m trying to figure out when the world went mad.

I can’t figure out when we all agreed to pay out huge sums of money to “bail out” banks so they wouldn’t go bankrupt. These are the institutions that allowed consumers and sometimes enticed them into loans that they had no business obtaining, leading to widespread foreclosures and bankruptcy across America.

These are also the institutions that have raised interest rates on credit cards to 29 percent (a record high) on folks who have been late on a couple of payments throughout the year. This is the banks’ way of penalizing you for having financial problems.

Doesn’t it seem ironic that the institutions that are penalizing their customers for having financial hardship have asked for bailout money to cover their financial hardships from the very taxpayers they are penalizing? The difference here is that the banks are being granted the money from the government — at your and my expense — by lawmakers who have not asked us how we feel about it.

I don’t really think that lawmakers should have to ask us how we feel about bailing the banks out — it should go without saying. I would hope that they can see clearly who is footing the bill for this and who is getting shafted on a daily basis.

If lawmakers had taken all the bailout money and distributed it to American taxpayers equally, hopefully most would have paid off mortgages, credit debt and so on. That not only helps consumers get out of debt, but also gives the public more spending power, which would stimulate our flat economy. It would also relieve the banks’ financial situations by recovering money from outstanding loans and credit.

Granted, not all taxpayers would pay off their bills, but I would imagine most would.

The crux of this is we, as American taxpayers, are the ones major industries and banking institutions turn to when they are faced with financial woes. They turn to us by asking our elected officials to grant them our money in forms of stimulus and bailout funds, and they receive it without the approval of the taxpayers, the ones funding the bailouts.

Granted, in the scope of the world economy, it is not good for a country’s banks to go under because of the holdings and investments they have abroad. However, it doesn’t make much sense for the very people who are coming to the aid of financial institutions to have their interest rates raised and to lose their homes as thanks for keeping financial institutions out of bankruptcy and saving their bacon.

Doesn’t it seem like the wrong people are reaping the rewards for the financial situation that this country is in? Doesn’t it seem like forgiveness is a one-way street when it comes to the financial woes of the American taxpayer and financial institutions?

The public needs to send a message to elected officials and banking institutions that enough is enough. Americans who are fed up with friends, neighbors and family members being displaced from their homes or financially ruined by rising interest rates on credit accounts need to tell their elected officials in Washington, D.C., that they want lawmakers to make bailouts a two-way street.

Banks should not be able to receive bailout money until they demonstrate that they are doing their part to reduce the overall debt and interest rates for all customers and to establish programs that will prevent Americans from losing their homes.

If the banks want the American public to work with them, they need to work with the American public.

The banks are not listening to their customers, so maybe they will listen if lawmakers step up and represent the public that they serve and stop just giving the store away. We need to insist that our elected officials put a stop to people being foreclosed on and forced into bankruptcy by banks and lending institutions and rather force them to work with the American public to resolve the financial situation in this country.

• Larry Hite is a Tracy resident and owner of Tracy Home Inspections. He is past president of Tracy Rotary, active in Habitat for Humanity, chairman of Tracy Entrepreneurs and co-founder of Central Valley Business Alliance.