Capitalism Guarantees Rising Inequality

[kaz]

Those aren't "ponzi" schemes. If you want to slam Wall Street because you trust government, that's up to you. But at least use words that make sense.

Are you fucking kidding me?

A Ponzi scheme is a form of pyramid scheme in which new investors must continually be sucked in at the bottom to support the investors at the top. In this case, new borrowers must continually be sucked in to support the creditors at the top.

When the banks ran out of creditworthy borrowers, they had to turn to uncreditworthy “subprime” borrowers; and to avoid losses from default, they moved these risky mortgages off their books by bundling them into “securities” and selling them to investors. To induce investors to buy, these securities were then “insured” with credit default swaps. But the housing bubble itself was another Ponzi scheme, and eventually there were no more borrowers to be sucked in at the bottom who could afford the ever-inflating home prices. When the subprime borrowers quit paying, the investors quit buying mortgage-backed securities. The banks were then left holding their own suspect paper; and without triple-A ratings, there is little chance that buyers for this “junk” will be found. The crisis is not, however, in the economy itself, which is fundamentally sound – or would be with a proper credit system to oil the wheels of production. The crisis is in the banking system, which can no longer cover up the shell game it has played for three centuries with other people’s money. - Credit Default Swaps: Evolving Financial Meltdown and Derivative Disaster Du Jour | Global Research

Then why didn't they turn to unworthy borrowers back in the 60s? 70s? 80s? 90s?

There were some nasty economic down turns back in those days, and surely the number of credit worthy borrowers would have fallen then.

Why did the number of credit worthy borrowers dry up in the late 90s? Was the economy just so bad all during the 90s, and no one knew it?

But instead they turned to unworthy borrowers in the middle of one of the longest periods of stable peace time growth, with low inflation, and stable interest rates? Really?

It's not a ponzi scheme, and your claim doesn't match up with the history.

Yes, exactly. Individual businesses screw up, and free markets fix that by crushing them. But the left would have you believe that

1) Clinton then W had policies of pressuring banks to make more sub-prime loans and funding them with endless virtually free cash.

2) But they expected them to make all these sub-prime roles in a responsible way.

3) Not one or two or even a few, but every bank followed that policy irresponsibly and failed.

4) Gasp then when the economy slowed, sub-prime borrowers started failing to make their payments. Who would have seen that coming?

So...

The free markets failed and the poor politicians had to bail them out. Sob. Sssurrrreeee, every bank made an independent decision at that point in time to loan to bad credit risks and fail. All of them.

It wasn't that by following explicit government policy and using government money that they did what they were pressured to do. Oh, no, you can't blame politicians for that.

 

[gnarlylove]

And the government officials have guns and banks don't

Guns don't rule the world, wealth does, power does. Ain't no individual got more power and wealth than those bankers. If the US won't even prosecute them in a court of law what makes you think the logical step is requiring the military? These bankers don't require a military coup. Hearings and back door meetings work much better, and both parties prefer it this way since they are already delicately involved with the governance process.

You refuse to accept that you might be wrong. Come on, guns would never be drawn on our financial sector, the basis of the American economy!!!! Are you nuts? Guns aren't the be all end all for every group of people. Just people like yourselves who never engage in the part of the world where guns need not apply.

Who lost in this scheme anyway? The way you make it sound the Banks loose...

Those who cannot afford homes experience the biggest loss. It's good you can spin this...

Actually you pulled that out of your ass because it's what you want it to sound like. Everyone...

"

Pardon me but you totally ignored the question. I was talking about those who lost the most. But I'm well aware you have no fucking integrity to agree on basic facts. Millions of families were put on the street because they couldn't afford to pay their fradulent mortgage.

So get your head out of your ass and don't spin the question. My point is clear: the bankers won whether the American public won or not. And yes, the bankers are doing exceptionally well for having essentially caused this recession.

Hell, you're saying everyone suffered and no duh! The dollar and economy was weakened. Panic rippled throughout but that's of course not the point at all though. I was noting how the bankers are doing great while we struggle through our anemic recovery, esp. those now without homes due to bad mortgages. Stop spinning all this so you can actually learn a valid point!

You don't have to always negate an opponent to be right. Sometimes you can just say nothing instead of make yourself appear like a spin-doctor who could never understand the basics of the world.

Liberals live in a dream world. The problem is you make real laws based on your fantasies, and as your blame the victim approach shows now, you don't learn from your mistakes.

Your last few statements were just petty attempts to categorize humans in a way to control the debate and make yourself feel better. Too bad its completely made up except that maybe its really a projection of how you see reality (i.e. fantasy) and how you must constantly distort reality/what you read so you can manage your ignoble beliefs.

Blaming the victim?!?! Can you admit who the biggest victim was of the bubble? THOSE FAMILIES WHO LOST THEIR HOME AND HAD NO OTHER HOME!! Like you are as bad off as those folks lumping yourself in their with "everyone." HA! Maybe so but GO fuck a cactus IFF you refuse to admit you did not loose as much as those who had fraudulent mortgages. You also need to realize the banks won because they bet on their fraudulent mortgages would be paid and that they would not be paid; thus they won either way! 91 billion in recent bonuses shores up this observation!

 

[kaz]

You refuse to accept that you might be wrong.

You haven't presented a logical argument. It's on you, not me until you do.

Come on, guns would never be drawn on our financial sector, the basis of the American economy!!!! Are you nuts? Guns aren't the be all end all for every group of people. Just people like yourselves who never engage in the part of the world where guns need not apply.

This is when I stopped reading. Government passes laws, taxes and regulations, if you don't do what they say, they come to arrest you. If you don't go, then they bring out the gun. If there were no guns, no one would follow their oppressive laws. That you don't even recognize the role of guns in that makes you a ninny with no grasp of the world.

I'll tell you what. Don't pay your taxes this year, don't cooperate when they come to arrest you. Then come back next year and tell me that the force of guns isn't behind what they do.

 

[georgephillip]

Where is Democracy to be found in a world where the three richest individuals have assets that exceed the combined GDP of 47 countries?

A world where the richest 2% of global citizens "own" more than 51% of global assets?

Ready for the best part?

Capitalism ensures an already bad problem will only get worse.

"The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) states that income inequality 'first started to rise in the late ‘70s and early ‘80s in America and Britain (and also in Israel)'.

"The ratio between the average incomes of the top 5 per cent to the bottom 5 per cent in the world increased from 78:1 in 1988, to 114:1 in 1993..."

"Stiglitz relays that from 1988 to 2008 people in the world’s top 1 per cent saw their incomes increase by 60 per cent, while those in the bottom 5 per cent had no change in their income.

"In America, home to the 2008 recession, from 2009 to 2012, incomes of the top 1 per cent in America, many of which no doubt had a greedy hand in the causes of the meltdown, increased more than 31 per cent, while the incomes of the 99 per cent grew 0.4 per cent less than half a percentage point."

Spotlight on Worldwide Inequality

There are alternatives that don't require infinite "growth."

so... what...? state-imposed socialism is the cure...?

Probably not if your definition of socialism implies even less democracy than we currently have in US workplaces.

"A worker cooperative is a cooperative self-managed by its workers.

"This control may be exercised in a number of ways.

"A cooperative enterprise may mean a firm where every worker-owner participates in decision making in a democratic fashion, or it may refer to one in which managers and administration is elected by every worker-owner, and finally it can refer to a situation in which managers are considered, and treated as, workers of the firm.

"In traditional forms of worker cooperative, all shares are held by the workforce with no outside or consumer owners, and each member has one voting share.

"In practice, control by worker-owners may be exercised through individual, collective or majority ownership by the workforce, or the retention of individual, collective or majority voting rights (exercised on a one-member one-vote basis).[1]

"A worker cooperative, therefore, has the characteristic that the majority of its workforce own shares, and the majority of shares are owned by the workforce.[2]"

Worker cooperative - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Toddsterpatriot]

And the government officials have guns and banks don't

Guns don't rule the world, wealth does, power does. Ain't no individual got more power and wealth than those bankers. If the US won't even prosecute them in a court of law what makes you think the logical step is requiring the military? These bankers don't require a military coup. Hearings and back door meetings work much better, and both parties prefer it this way since they are already delicately involved with the governance process.

You refuse to accept that you might be wrong. Come on, guns would never be drawn on our financial sector, the basis of the American economy!!!! Are you nuts? Guns aren't the be all end all for every group of people. Just people like yourselves who never engage in the part of the world where guns need not apply.

Who lost in this scheme anyway? The way you make it sound the Banks loose...

Those who cannot afford homes experience the biggest loss. It's good you can spin this...

Actually you pulled that out of your ass because it's what you want it to sound like. Everyone...

"

Pardon me but you totally ignored the question. I was talking about those who lost the most. But I'm well aware you have no fucking integrity to agree on basic facts. Millions of families were put on the street because they couldn't afford to pay their fradulent mortgage.

So get your head out of your ass and don't spin the question. My point is clear: the bankers won whether the American public won or not. And yes, the bankers are doing exceptionally well for having essentially caused this recession.

Hell, you're saying everyone suffered and no duh! The dollar and economy was weakened. Panic rippled throughout but that's of course not the point at all though. I was noting how the bankers are doing great while we struggle through our anemic recovery, esp. those now without homes due to bad mortgages. Stop spinning all this so you can actually learn a valid point!

You don't have to always negate an opponent to be right. Sometimes you can just say nothing instead of make yourself appear like a spin-doctor who could never understand the basics of the world.

Liberals live in a dream world. The problem is you make real laws based on your fantasies, and as your blame the victim approach shows now, you don't learn from your mistakes.

Your last few statements were just petty attempts to categorize humans in a way to control the debate and make yourself feel better. Too bad its completely made up except that maybe its really a projection of how you see reality (i.e. fantasy) and how you must constantly distort reality/what you read so you can manage your ignoble beliefs.

Blaming the victim?!?! Can you admit who the biggest victim was of the bubble? THOSE FAMILIES WHO LOST THEIR HOME AND HAD NO OTHER HOME!! Like you are as bad off as those folks lumping yourself in their with "everyone." HA! Maybe so but GO fuck a cactus IFF you refuse to admit you did not loose as much as those who had fraudulent mortgages. You also need to realize the banks won because they bet on their fraudulent mortgages would be paid and that they would not be paid; thus they won either way! 91 billion in recent bonuses shores up this observation!

Millions of families were put on the street because they couldn't afford to pay their fradulent mortgage.

Fraudulent? Please explain further.

 

[georgephillip]

We all should have the right to quality food and shelter.

Where in the hell is that written?!?

Also, I would assume then that you agree you should labor for 10 to 12 hours per day to provide me with that "quality food and shelter" I'm entitled to while I relax on my hammock reading the musings of Karl Marx? No lying either. I want the honest answer here.

"The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) is a declaration adopted by the United Nations General Assembly on 10 December 1948 at the Palais de Chaillot, Paris. The Declaration arose directly from the experience of the Second World War and represents the first global expression of rights to which all human beings are inherently entitled. The full text is published by the United Nations on its website."

Can you wrap your mind around the possibility that your inherent rights to quality food, shelter, education, and more is available from the same sources FDR tapped for Social Security and Unemployment Insurance?

Universal Declaration of Human Rights - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[gnarlylove]

This is when I stopped reading.

How convenient. It was the beginning of my post and it enables you to make intellectually dishonest statements like "You haven't made any logical argument." Your strategy is to tune out and name call. I presented how the banks have kept their profits soaring as Americans suffer but the biggest loss comes to those who were relying on a fraudulent mortgage. You just ignore this because it doesn't fit your narrow understanding. What a fucking desperate person to maintain their ignoble beliefs! Be sure to only watch mass media so you don't learn what's really going on.

Government passes laws, taxes and regulations, if you don't do what they say, they come to arrest you.

You are right. This is how the IDEAL Government is suppose to operate. But IT DOESN"T OPERATE THIS WAY!

It's ONLY IF YOU ARE CAUGHT DO THEY ARREST YOU. Guns are to be drawn under limited circumstances. And so as long as you can hide your crimes (financial and white collar crimes are easily hidden buried deep in internal documents that are shredded and deleted) you never have to worry about being arrested. Being arrested rarely means having a gun pulled on you! I know since I've been arrested over 30 times. Guns aren't used every time to enforce the law. You would only believe this if you watched COPS the TV show. O wait, you do? OK. Makes sense.

Even if you are arrested you have the option, if you are rich, to pay people to reduce or dismiss your crime entirely. Lawyers are means to an end and hardly are used to argue justice. They ONLY deal with cases that are brought before them and the rest of the injustice continues in America without any fair trial.

f there were no guns, no one would follow their oppressive laws.

No one is holding a gun to your head but you drive 55mph. No one is hold a gun to your head and saying don't steal anything in this store but you don't steal anyway. The threat of being shot is not the reason people tend to obey laws. This is just a result of you black and white understanding of reality: might makes right.

Cultural and peer pressures do WAY more to herd the public into obeying than guns. This is a well known sociological fact. We obey mostly because it enables us to keep our job (not go to jail) and pay for our family instead of paying court fees etc.

You just have no concept of how powerful Wall St. is. These powerful men communicate with our gov't and let them know that, as STEVE BARTLETT says "If you want a strong economy, you have to have financial services companies that are safe and sound and able to lend and able to finance their— their customers. Now, if you want to have a recession, then go ahead and— and— and hammer the banks, and you know, make sure that they’re— that they fail because then you’ll have another recession."

 

[bripat9643]

We all should have the right to quality food and shelter.

Where in the hell is that written?!?

Also, I would assume then that you agree you should labor for 10 to 12 hours per day to provide me with that "quality food and shelter" I'm entitled to while I relax on my hammock reading the musings of Karl Marx? No lying either. I want the honest answer here.

"The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) is a declaration adopted by the United Nations General Assembly on 10 December 1948 at the Palais de Chaillot, Paris. The Declaration arose directly from the experience of the Second World War and represents the first global expression of rights to which all human beings are inherently entitled. The full text is published by the United Nations on its website."

Can you wrap your mind around the possibility that your inherent rights to quality food, shelter, education, and more is available from the same sources FDR tapped for Social Security and Unemployment Insurance?

Universal Declaration of Human Rights - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

In other words, you have no inherent right to quality food, shelter or education. Theft does not give you a right to anything other than a jail cell. The fact that FDR put one over on the American people proves nothing more than that he is a very skilled liar. The United Nations and the UDHR have even less credibility and no legal force in this country.

 

[bripat9643]

And the government officials have guns and banks don't

Guns don't rule the world, wealth does, power does. Ain't no individual got more power and wealth than those bankers. If the US won't even prosecute them in a court of law what makes you think the logical step is requiring the military? These bankers don't require a military coup. Hearings and back door meetings work much better, and both parties prefer it this way since they are already delicately involved with the governance process.

You refuse to accept that you might be wrong. Come on, guns would never be drawn on our financial sector, the basis of the American economy!!!! Are you nuts? Guns aren't the be all end all for every group of people. Just people like yourselves who never engage in the part of the world where guns need not apply.



"

Pardon me but you totally ignored the question. I was talking about those who lost the most. But I'm well aware you have no fucking integrity to agree on basic facts. Millions of families were put on the street because they couldn't afford to pay their fradulent mortgage.

So get your head out of your ass and don't spin the question. My point is clear: the bankers won whether the American public won or not. And yes, the bankers are doing exceptionally well for having essentially caused this recession.

Hell, you're saying everyone suffered and no duh! The dollar and economy was weakened. Panic rippled throughout but that's of course not the point at all though. I was noting how the bankers are doing great while we struggle through our anemic recovery, esp. those now without homes due to bad mortgages. Stop spinning all this so you can actually learn a valid point!

You don't have to always negate an opponent to be right. Sometimes you can just say nothing instead of make yourself appear like a spin-doctor who could never understand the basics of the world.

Liberals live in a dream world. The problem is you make real laws based on your fantasies, and as your blame the victim approach shows now, you don't learn from your mistakes.

Your last few statements were just petty attempts to categorize humans in a way to control the debate and make yourself feel better. Too bad its completely made up except that maybe its really a projection of how you see reality (i.e. fantasy) and how you must constantly distort reality/what you read so you can manage your ignoble beliefs.

Blaming the victim?!?! Can you admit who the biggest victim was of the bubble? THOSE FAMILIES WHO LOST THEIR HOME AND HAD NO OTHER HOME!! Like you are as bad off as those folks lumping yourself in their with "everyone." HA! Maybe so but GO fuck a cactus IFF you refuse to admit you did not loose as much as those who had fraudulent mortgages. You also need to realize the banks won because they bet on their fraudulent mortgages would be paid and that they would not be paid; thus they won either way! 91 billion in recent bonuses shores up this observation!

Millions of families were put on the street because they couldn't afford to pay their fradulent mortgage.

Fraudulent? Please explain further.

They didn't own a home before they signed their mortgages, for which they put no money down, and they didn't own one after they defaulted. While they were able to make the payments, and for a considerable period afterwards, they lived in a much better home than they could actually afford.

I don't see how they were harmed. What did they lose?

The banks who gave them the mortgage, on the other hand, lost billions of dollars.

 

[gnarlylove]

Fraudulent? Please explain further.

Mortgage fraud is a crime in which the intent is to materially misrepresent or omit information on a mortgage loan application to obtain a loan or to obtain a larger loan than would have been obtained had the lender or borrower known the truth.

From Mortgage Fraud

Suspicious Activity Reports pertaining to Mortgage fraud increased by 1,411 percent between 1997 and 2005. Both borrowers seeking to obtain homes they could not otherwise afford, and industry insiders seeking monetary gain, were implicated.[94]

From Causes of the United States housing bubble

There are many layers of fraud happening here. The underwritters were people contracted by the banks to approve the recent inundation of new loans. Many of these underwritters went to their supervisors and pointed out fraud on these application saying these people simply cannot afford this home. Their supervisor said "Fraud" is the "F" word, don't use it. You underwritters are suppose to approve these loans whether they can afford it or not. If you don't believe me just listen to some underwritters:

Here is a brief interview of an underwritter contractor.

"Close to 1.2 million borrowers, or about 30 percent of the more than 3.9 million households whose properties were foreclosed on by 11 leading financial institutions in 2009 and 2010, had to battle potentially wrongful efforts to seize their homes despite not having defaulted on their loans, being protected under a host of federal laws, or having been in good standing under bank-approved plans to either restructure their mortgages or temporarily delay required payments."
From Foreclosure Review Finds Potentially Widespread Errors

It isn't very hard to discover errors and fraudulent activity. But it is for you when you refuse to do any homework on your own. The mass media covers up stories that harms our understanding of capitalism, wealth, and the banking system. It relies on political attacks to incite anger in folks like you to take action. however, when you take action its against your fellow man, not against these banks and institutions that have crippled our economy.

 

[kaz]

This is when I stopped reading.

How convenient

You disputed that government is forcing their will on us with guns, it was a pretty good reason to not take anything you said seriously.

f there were no guns, no one would follow their oppressive laws.

No one is holding a gun to your head but you drive 55mph. No one is hold a gun to your head and saying don't steal anything in this store but you don't steal anyway. The threat of being shot is not the reason people tend to obey laws. This is just a result of you black and white understanding of reality: might makes right.

My bad, I forgot that liberals are incapable of grasping cause and effect.

I drive "55" because if I don't I would get a ticket. If I don't pay the ticket, they will come to arrest me. If I don't go with them, they will pull out guns.

I don't steal because I'm honest, but if I were not, I know if I steal, they would call the cops. This time they would just pull out the gun in the first place.

Note every sequence ends in government guns. As someone who's smarter than you, not bragging it's a low hurdle, I realize that not following government's laws ends up in government guns. And yeah, if I don't capitulate at some point, I will get shot. I recognize cause and effect, I don't need to actually see the gun.

Liberals really are seriously not smart. You seriously don't get this?

 

[georgephillip]

Capitalism guarantees nothing.

And that's the beauty of it.

Fuck anyone who thinks otherwise.

Capitalism guarantees consolidation of wealth into fewer and fewer hands with each passing generation which is beautiful only to butt fucked slaves.

It does no such thing. That's nothing but commie propaganda. This "inequality" meme is similar to the global warming meme and the "red lining" meme. These are all propaganda campaigns designed to justify more socialism. They have no basis in fact.

"A HOLC 1936 security map of Philadelphia showing redlining of lower income neighborhoods.[1] Households and businesses in the red zones could not get mortgages or business loans.

"Redlining is the practice of denying, or charging more for, services such as banking, insurance,[2] access to health care,[3] or even supermarkets,[4] or denying jobs to residents in particular, often racially determined,[5] areas.

"The term 'redlining' was coined in the late 1960s by John McKnight, a sociologist and community activist.[6]

"It refers to the practice of marking a red line on a map to delineate the area where banks would not invest; later the term was applied to discrimination against a particular group of people (usually by race or sex) irrespective of geography.

"During the heyday of redlining, the areas most frequently discriminated against were black inner city neighborhoods.

"For example, in Atlanta in the 1980s, a Pulitzer Prize-winning series of articles by investigative-reporter Bill Dedman showed that banks would often lend to lower-income whites but not to middle- or upper-income blacks."

Economic inequality and red lining are just as real as the racist, conservative propaganda memes that created them, as you prove with nearly every post

Redlining - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[gnarlylove]

If you think people who were put on the street due to mortgage fraud are better off than the multi-billion dollar banks than PLEASE DO NOT REPLY TO MY MESSAGES.

Let me be clear, the banks losts millions but were bailed out and given millions. They should have never entered these deals in the first place if it were for the fact the brought the global economy to its knees and in order to save the value of the dollar and the system, US need to supply 7.7 trillion to various institutions around the world. TARP was merely a warm-up.

You are ignoring the fact the banks have fully recovered and have given themselves 91 billion in bonuses this past Christmas. All the banks are doing quite fine. But we can't say the same for the American families who are struggling to bounce back from the biggest recession since The Great Depression.

 

[kaz]

You just have no concept of how powerful Wall St. is. These powerful men communicate with our gov't and let them know that, as STEVE BARTLETT says "If you want a strong economy, you have to have financial services companies that are safe and sound and able to lend and able to finance their— their customers. Now, if you want to have a recession, then go ahead and— and— and hammer the banks, and you know, make sure that they’re— that they fail because then you’ll have another recession."

OK, think about the blatantly obvious. Government is in bed with the big bankers. They are, and I keep saying that if you are reading all my posts on this. Government and big bankers are in an unholy alliance where the big bankers try to limit competition and politicians love power.

So if you really, truly recognized that, government regulates for the purpose of helping big bankers, then you would OPPOSE regulation. The so called "deregulation" was not deregulation, it was crony capitalism to help the big bankers. What we need is ACTUAL deregulation, where government gets out of the market and allows the small players to compete, just like happened with the airline industry when government ended the oligopoly of the big carriers who owned all the takeoff and landing slots.

Again, you are arguing that big finance controls government, and you want to make government MORE powerful. Your argument is just a joke. You don't believe that, you just want big government.

 

[kaz]

If you think people who were put on the street due to mortgage fraud are better off than the multi-billion dollar banks than PLEASE DO NOT REPLY TO MY MESSAGES.

That's a strawman, no one is arguing that. You pulled it out of your ass.

You are ignoring the fact the banks have fully recovered and have given themselves 91 billion in bonuses this past Christmas. All the banks are doing quite fine. But we can't say the same for the American families who are struggling to bounce back from the biggest recession since The Great Depression.

So let's have government stop screwing them. As for Wall Street bonuses, if you don't pay your employees they won't work for you. Maybe you'd like to see American businesses shut down, but that would make it worse for the man on the street you claim to care about, not better.

 

[gnarlylove]

kaz, your whole understanding of the world is based in fear. you drive and act responsibly because it enables you to continue making choices for yourself. by obeying laws you get to make other choices that lead to life liberty and happiness.

you do it not because of the fear of a gun shot, rather you do it because it makes sense! when you are caught acting irresponsible your ability to make choices are limited to a jail cell. being shot or threatened with being shot is NOT THE PRIME MOTIVATION for most people.

of course it is for you but your world is very different than anyone i know. and thank god. fear keeps people scared and repressed. fuck that! i want liberty and i'm willing to act certain ways in order to maintain a large chunk of my liberty. but if you read my signature you'll see that my aim is total liberty without regulation. the difference between us is you are a neo-libertarian and I am a classical libertarian (dating back to the enlightenment).

 

[gnarlylove]

That's a strawman, no one is arguing that. You pulled it out of your ass.

I was talking to todders with whom I've had a slight history and have noticed the patterns that lend itself to wasting my time. turns out i was wrong though, it was briapat or whatever who said:
"
I don't see how they were harmed. What did they lose?

The banks who gave them the mortgage, on the other hand, lost billions of dollars."
I was responding to this with major disgust as you recognized "no one is arguing it" because it sounds stupid. turns out it was being argued...

as for you i have not really been reading previous posts and apologize since you agree that banks and gov't is in bed.

regarding regulation though, it isn't black and white either.

when you regulate what someone can do, this can sometimes benefit the public good. do you agree? or do you think all instances of regulation results in harming the public good?

 

[gnarlylove]

As for Wall Street bonuses, if you don't pay your employees they won't work for you..

it wasn't the bankers you see every day getting these bonuses. it was bonuses to the board of directors and the CEO. that is it! the the employees working on derivatives may have been tossed a bone but the overwhelming majority of bonuses did not go to employees.

 

[georgephillip]

"In 2012, the top 5 percent of earners were responsible for 38 percent of domestic consumption, up from 28 percent in 1995, the researchers found.]

How could they possibly measure what someone consumed?

""Even more striking, the current recovery has been driven almost entirely by the upper crust, according to Mr. Fazzari and Mr. Cynamon. Since 2009, the year the recession ended, inflation-adjusted spending by this top echelon has risen 17 percent, compared with just 1 percent among the bottom 95 percent.".

Again, how would they know what a given individual spends? Do they have access to his checking account records and his credit card bills?

Those who doubt the US middle class is steadily eroding should ask the business world

"In response to the upward shift in spending, PricewaterhouseCoopers clients like big stores and restaurants are chasing richer customers with a wider offering of high-end goods and services, or focusing on rock-bottom prices to attract the expanding ranks of penny-pinching consumers.

“'As a retailer or restaurant chain, if you’re not at the really high level or the low level, that’s a tough place to be,' Mr. Maxwell said. 'You don’t want to be stuck in the middle.'”

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/03/business/the-middle-class-is-steadily-eroding-just-ask-the-business-world.html?_r=1

Well that's really scientific.

So far you've got zip, nada, nothing.

Even if that were true, it would still dwarf your contribution.

"In Manhattan, the upscale clothing retailer Barneys will replace the bankrupt discounter Loehmann’s, whose Chelsea store closes in a few weeks.

"Across the country, Olive Garden and Red Lobster restaurants are struggling, while fine-dining chains like Capital Grille are thriving.

"And at General Electric, the increase in demand for high-end dishwashers and refrigerators dwarfs sales growth of mass-market models.

"As politicians and pundits in Washington continue to spar over whether economic inequality is in fact deepening, in corporate America there really is no debate at all.

"The post-recession reality is that the customer base for businesses that appeal to the middle class is shrinking as the top tier pulls even further away.

"'Those consumers who have capital like real estate and stocks and are in the top 20 percent are feeling pretty good,' said John G. Maxwell, head of the global retail and consumer practice at PricewaterhouseCoopers."

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/03/business/the-middle-class-is-steadily-eroding-just-ask-the-business-world.html?_r=2

 

[kaz]

That's a strawman, no one is arguing that. You pulled it out of your ass.

I was talking to todders with whom I've had a slight history and have noticed the patterns that lend itself to wasting my time. turns out i was wrong though, it was briapat or whatever who said:
"
I don't see how they were harmed. What did they lose?

The banks who gave them the mortgage, on the other hand, lost billions of dollars."
I was responding to this with major disgust as you recognized "no one is arguing it" because it sounds stupid. turns out it was being argued...

as for you i have not really been reading previous posts and apologize since you agree that banks and gov't is in bed.

Fair enough, we're good.

regarding regulation though, it isn't black and white either.

when you regulate what someone can do, this can sometimes benefit the public good. do you agree? or do you think all instances of regulation results in harming the public good?

I'm a libertarian, but one area I differ from many librarians is that I consider it a legitimate government role to require accurate disclosure by companies to consumers. One of the most successful regulations ever (OK, short list) was the government approach to privacy policies. The government said companies can have virtually any privacy policy they want, including virtually no privacy. But they must have one and they must disclose it. Then they only went after the companies that violated their own states policy. I believe an informed consumer is a more empowered consumer, I don't get libertarians who oppose that.

However, Wall Street regulations are nothing like that. They are simply geared towards crony capitalism where politicians and big bankers crush competition and dominate the market for their mutual benefit. More regulation means more power for them, it has zero to do for the benefit of investors. Recognizing that and believing the solution is MORE government is logically just whacked, and it'll result in more of same.