"Lloyd Blankfein and Jamie Dimon get billions of dollars for free, from the Federal Reserve."
That is the fault of our legislature and our presidents (former and current) for supporting them, not Wall Street. If you chastise people for taking free money, then may natural selection take its course and morons can run our top companies. BTW- rollingstone, huffingtonpost, politico, foxnews, etc. should be banned hosts from links as far as I'm concerned, if the intent of HN is to limit politicking.
"That is the fault of our legislature and our presidents (former and current) for supporting them, not Wall Street."
Are you willfully ignoring the massive role that lobbying (and other forms of corporate money in politics) plays in all of this, or are you just that naive?
He's not ignoring it at all, he's absolutely right. It's still the fault of those who write and sign the laws.
Lobbying is legal and means others get their input to the legislators but ultimately the buck still stops with Congress and the President.
If you have a problem with lobbying, again...that is still the fault of the politicians, not those doing the lobbying. They're acting within the bounds of the law.
I agree, but I was referring to lobbying in particular.
The phrase "if you have enough money to influence the law" indicates not that the corporations did something illegal/unethical (why wouldn't they spend money to get their input heard?), but rather indicates corrupt politicians who would make decisions and laws based on who spent the most money.
The United States was constructed in the shadow of centuries kings and tyrants. The US government was built to be feeble, and thus accountable to its people.
What the founders could not have predicted was that one day, that feebleness could allow the country to be hijacked by powers that make kings look cute by comparison.
Our system isn't built to withstand the manipulation of corporate interests. There's not a lot I can do about that from where I'm sitting. But the fact that the store was left unlocked by a shady employee doesn't exonerate the thieves who made off with its contents.
There's often no distinction between those who spend money and those who make the decisions. The revolving door between Washington and big financial interests is absurd. Healthcare and finance are both in a state of regulatory capture that would be comical were it not so tragic.
This strikes me as a non-sequitur.
There's a lot of bad stuff you can do without actually committing a crime. Especially if you have enough money to influence the law.
And it's the Government's job to make sure that "bad stuff" (ie stuff that actively and deliberately hurts people, not just standard non-optimal stuff) is illegal.
If a legal moneymaking niche exists, somebody will fill it. Even if it's immoral, because... hey, people are extremely good at convincing themselves that anything is moral if it happens to be in their own interests. The government's job is to prevent any harmful yet legal niches from arising, and the job of the people is to make sure that pressure is put on the government to eradicate said niches... even when they'd much rather take campaign contributions from the people in 'em.
This comment is free of examples, because I don't feel like discussing any specific cases.
If the politicians are responsible, that doesn’t mean Wall Street isn’t also responsible. Blame is a non-zero-sum concept. If I lobby for the right to dump toxic waste in a river, do we really say “lobbying is legal, blame the politicians for the toxic waste?” No, we ought to blame me for dumping toxic waste whether it’s legal or not, and blame me again for making it legal by lobbying.
Summary: Yes, it’s great to find fault with the political system, but that doesn’t absolve Wall Street or anybody else of the obligation to act ethically. In fact, the definition of ethics is pretty much Doing the right thing when not compelled to do so by consequences, legal or otherwise.
If someone offers you a lot of money to do something unethical and you accept it, how is it the fault of the other person? You're the one doing something unethical.
Lobbyists are just doing their job. If people don't like politicians who are swayed by lobbyists, vote them out of office and elect someone who won't accept lobbyist money. That's one of the benefits of a democratic republic.
I can't tell if you're being serious or if this is a joke, which is unfortunately often the case when I run into people willing to defend modern Wall Street online.
sigh.
Assuming you aren't joking...
"If someone offers you a lot of money to do something unethical and you accept it, how is it the fault of the other person?"
So if I offer you $1 million to kill someone, I have no fault when it comes to the murder? I mean, it isn't like I killed someone, right?
We live in a democracy with free speech. This means that people are permitted to go to elected officials and ask for whatever they want. It's the job of the politicians to say no.
Incidentally, I don't know if you realize this, but the biggest lobbyists are primarily labor unions (e.g., the NEA, who donate more money than Goldman Sachs) and professional groups (realtors, trial lawyers), not corporations.
For reference, All time #6 is the NEA with $37M, #7 is Goldman with $36M.
If you look at people counts, the NEA has about 3.2 million people. Goldman has about 36,000 employees. Two orders of magnitude more contribution per person.
As a smaller business, their interests in the law are more targeted. And their lobbying is also very effective.
You can speak freely to politicians, but getting them to listen is not free. You buy their ear with campaign contributions and you hold the hammer of future contributions as you make polite suggestions about how the law should be changed in your favor.
I don't think it's fair to put politicians under that pressure. There's clear evidence that our system has failed in that way and we need to change it to move forward.
foannfeai: The "free money", awesome tax breaks and the basic free ride WS gets did not just happen, its the result of 30+ years of systematic lobbying and the actual embedding of WS types in government. The OWS protests are finally bringing attention to this issue.
The responsibility for something rarely falls on one party's shoulders. The banks are like a contractor who was in charge of building the foundation of your house, but instead bet the bricks in a game of dice (and lost). When the foreman finds out, he reluctantly gives the contractor more bricks, because he's the only foundation contractor in town. You are the owner of the house. Now, sure, you should be mad at the foreman for letting this clown gamble the bricks away. But if you didn't also demand the contractor get fired, I'd say that's just a bit shortsighted.
They're not winning, they're cheating! So instead of stopping them from cheating, the government should ask for a percentage of the take, and raise their taxes!
And on a related note: The obvious alternative is regulation. Consider this amusing/depressing look at why Wall Street regulation (as it stands) is a spectacular failure, consider this article in the Wall Street Journal: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405297020448530457664...
Select quotes:
"In 298 pages, rather than sketching out simple, clear rules for banks to follow, regulators essentially wonder out loud how they can possibly write this rule. Officially there are 383 questions posed in the document, but many of these questions have multiple parts... Bank lobbyists are certainly eager to provide some hand-holding."
"Dodd and Frank punted this one to the executive branch, invested federal agencies with new authority, and expected the same regulators who failed to prevent the last crisis to somehow avert the next one."
"Until the government is willing to create a durable financial system that allows failure, the best policy response is to make the rules so simple that even Washington can enforce them."
Charging them the same taxes as everyone else would be a start. Capital gains my ass.
Then we can maybe look at the market failure that led their pay to skyrocket over the last 30 years while getting worse at their job of efficiently allocating capital. (Blowing up a bubble every 5-7 years does not look like a good job to me).
Nearly every OWS gathering I've seen pictures of, and nearly every proposed OWS list of things they want changed, has included strengthening or reinstating regulations aimed at stopping them from cheating.
I wonder how many other people on HN have grown deeply suspicious of Taibbi's reporting on Wall Street. Presumably he's more in his element in a story like this that doesn't require him to understand the concept of, say, a market maker. I enjoy reading him... when he's not setting off my BS detector.
As fun as Taibbi is to read, though, this isn't hacker news; it's a good submission to /r/politics. I flagged it, and you should too.
Agreed. Political discussions rarely go well on HN, and anything written by Matt Taibbi is not a good basis for a political discussion anyway. He's a deeply dishonest writer, and even on topics where I agree with him I can't stand to have his axe-grinding in the discussion.
I like his candor and think his "axes" add something to his coverage of horse-race politics. He's a valuable perspective to have following random Presidential candidates.
But for material like this, if you want a market skeptic, you probably want to be reading 5 Felix Salmon posts for every 1 Taibbi piece you consume.
My politics are probably very similar to Taibbi's (it's hard to tell, given Taibbi's gonzo Russian period). But bullshit is bullshit even when you want to agree with it.
He was the only one beating this drum until the Occupy movement showed up. Being the only political writer to recognize something while the rest are covering inside-the-beltway gossip girl is, well, you could call it axe-grinding but you could also call it being perceptive.
26 comments
[ 2.8 ms ] story [ 56.7 ms ] threadThat is the fault of our legislature and our presidents (former and current) for supporting them, not Wall Street. If you chastise people for taking free money, then may natural selection take its course and morons can run our top companies. BTW- rollingstone, huffingtonpost, politico, foxnews, etc. should be banned hosts from links as far as I'm concerned, if the intent of HN is to limit politicking.
Are you willfully ignoring the massive role that lobbying (and other forms of corporate money in politics) plays in all of this, or are you just that naive?
Lobbying is legal and means others get their input to the legislators but ultimately the buck still stops with Congress and the President.
If you have a problem with lobbying, again...that is still the fault of the politicians, not those doing the lobbying. They're acting within the bounds of the law.
This strikes me as a non-sequitur.
There's a lot of bad stuff you can do without actually committing a crime. Especially if you have enough money to influence the law.
I like that the final defense of the financial sector's misdeeds is to stammer "Well, it's not strictly illegal!"
The phrase "if you have enough money to influence the law" indicates not that the corporations did something illegal/unethical (why wouldn't they spend money to get their input heard?), but rather indicates corrupt politicians who would make decisions and laws based on who spent the most money.
What the founders could not have predicted was that one day, that feebleness could allow the country to be hijacked by powers that make kings look cute by comparison.
Our system isn't built to withstand the manipulation of corporate interests. There's not a lot I can do about that from where I'm sitting. But the fact that the store was left unlocked by a shady employee doesn't exonerate the thieves who made off with its contents.
There's often no distinction between those who spend money and those who make the decisions. The revolving door between Washington and big financial interests is absurd. Healthcare and finance are both in a state of regulatory capture that would be comical were it not so tragic.
And it's the Government's job to make sure that "bad stuff" (ie stuff that actively and deliberately hurts people, not just standard non-optimal stuff) is illegal.
If a legal moneymaking niche exists, somebody will fill it. Even if it's immoral, because... hey, people are extremely good at convincing themselves that anything is moral if it happens to be in their own interests. The government's job is to prevent any harmful yet legal niches from arising, and the job of the people is to make sure that pressure is put on the government to eradicate said niches... even when they'd much rather take campaign contributions from the people in 'em.
This comment is free of examples, because I don't feel like discussing any specific cases.
Summary: Yes, it’s great to find fault with the political system, but that doesn’t absolve Wall Street or anybody else of the obligation to act ethically. In fact, the definition of ethics is pretty much Doing the right thing when not compelled to do so by consequences, legal or otherwise.
If someone offers you a lot of money to do something unethical and you accept it, how is it the fault of the other person? You're the one doing something unethical.
Lobbyists are just doing their job. If people don't like politicians who are swayed by lobbyists, vote them out of office and elect someone who won't accept lobbyist money. That's one of the benefits of a democratic republic.
sigh.
Assuming you aren't joking...
"If someone offers you a lot of money to do something unethical and you accept it, how is it the fault of the other person?"
So if I offer you $1 million to kill someone, I have no fault when it comes to the murder? I mean, it isn't like I killed someone, right?
Incidentally, I don't know if you realize this, but the biggest lobbyists are primarily labor unions (e.g., the NEA, who donate more money than Goldman Sachs) and professional groups (realtors, trial lawyers), not corporations.
http://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/list.php?order=A
If you look at people counts, the NEA has about 3.2 million people. Goldman has about 36,000 employees. Two orders of magnitude more contribution per person.
As a smaller business, their interests in the law are more targeted. And their lobbying is also very effective.
You can speak freely to politicians, but getting them to listen is not free. You buy their ear with campaign contributions and you hold the hammer of future contributions as you make polite suggestions about how the law should be changed in your favor.
I don't think it's fair to put politicians under that pressure. There's clear evidence that our system has failed in that way and we need to change it to move forward.
Wait a minute.
Select quotes:
"In 298 pages, rather than sketching out simple, clear rules for banks to follow, regulators essentially wonder out loud how they can possibly write this rule. Officially there are 383 questions posed in the document, but many of these questions have multiple parts... Bank lobbyists are certainly eager to provide some hand-holding."
"Dodd and Frank punted this one to the executive branch, invested federal agencies with new authority, and expected the same regulators who failed to prevent the last crisis to somehow avert the next one."
"Until the government is willing to create a durable financial system that allows failure, the best policy response is to make the rules so simple that even Washington can enforce them."
Then we can maybe look at the market failure that led their pay to skyrocket over the last 30 years while getting worse at their job of efficiently allocating capital. (Blowing up a bubble every 5-7 years does not look like a good job to me).
As fun as Taibbi is to read, though, this isn't hacker news; it's a good submission to /r/politics. I flagged it, and you should too.
But for material like this, if you want a market skeptic, you probably want to be reading 5 Felix Salmon posts for every 1 Taibbi piece you consume.
My politics are probably very similar to Taibbi's (it's hard to tell, given Taibbi's gonzo Russian period). But bullshit is bullshit even when you want to agree with it.