No fucking shit.
Oct. 24th, 2008 05:01 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
gridloreI made a mistake in presuming that the self-interest of organizations, specifically banks and others, was such as they were best capable of protecting their own shareholders.- Alan Greenspan, former Chairman of the Federal Reserve.
No, really? Amazing. See, I figured that one out in the wake of the Savings and Loan debacle. I saw it again when I read about the robber barons and the birth of the labor movement. Anytime there is a chance to gain wealth, power, and/or prestige, unethical people will flock to it. People who will flout the laws, break the rules, and trample everyone to get their particular brass ring. They may even be a distinct minority, but when there are tens of thousands of bankers, even a 1% rate of occurrence for these thugs means hundreds or thousands of them.
Lord & Sons would be much better off if I had a pintel-mounted M2HB Machine Gun. I see a truck from White Cap or another of our rivals? BUDDABUDDABUDDABUDDABUDDABUDDA. But we have laws that keep us from doing that. So we are forced to beat them into the ground with better service and competitive prices. Darn it.
Folks, I am a high-school dropout. Why the FUCK do I grasp the concept of "people are greedy fucks, and given the chance, will screw their own grandmothers to make a buck" better than a man with a couple of advanced degrees?
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Date: 25 Oct 2008 00:10 (UTC)Because if he admitted it then he'd have to admit that there *IS* a need for sensible regulation of business and industry. And the fact that he played no part in ensuring such regulation existed would mean he's admitting to at least being something between derelict in his duty and criminally negligent.
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Date: 25 Oct 2008 00:15 (UTC)BTW, I allow anonymous posts, but request that people identify themselves in them. So, who are you?
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Date: 25 Oct 2008 00:21 (UTC)no subject
Date: 25 Oct 2008 00:31 (UTC)no subject
Date: 25 Oct 2008 00:23 (UTC)I have yet to figure out how No Regulations and Trickle Down Economics are supposed to work in the Real World. And I'm a Bookkeeper.
It should be noted that there are reports coming out now that state - Since WWII, the economy has grown and the Wealth of the Nation has Increased during... Democratic Presidents. The economy has failed under the Republican Dudes.
The moral was If you want the Economy to Grow - Vote Democratic.
You don't.
Date: 25 Oct 2008 01:41 (UTC)May I recommend the book Shock Doctrine by Naomi Klein? A pretty decent deconstruction of the Chicago School, with copious footnotes and references.
If you want to look further back, to the last time we had this Freidmanite system, I suggest Late Victorian Holocausts by Mike Davies.
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Date: 25 Oct 2008 14:59 (UTC)From my POV, it's absolutely stunning how closely the whole "short selling" thing parallels what happened back in the days when the "corner" was first invented. It's the same idea; monopolise a specialised area of trades and then deliberately drive the market into wild oscillations in order to profit on the losses of those who were unprepared for the swing. It's like making bets on how many times you can jump up and down on the gunwale of the lifeboat. And the whole thing gets a lot worse if you toss in the craziness of dark liquidity (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_liquidity)...
I'm beginning to wonder if there's any limit to the number of times humanity can kick itself in the head without learning anything from the experience.