Argument with a banker

American friends of ours in the banking industry were going on about how the financial crisis was the governments fault and banking was "along for the ride".


Then they started to launch an assault on the welfare state.


My hubby pointed out that banking is the biggest welfare recipient in America that the amount they have been bailed out by government amounts to far more than the total paid to welfare recipients probably in the entire history of welfare.


The inference was made that bankers bonuses and salaries are just like welfare payments to a single mom with 4 kids, with the only difference being the number of zeros at the end.


Of course they didn't agree blah blah blah we work hard blah blah blah.


I think work is one thing but who pays your salary is another. Banker/welfare queen, you are still on the government dole these days.


Anyone have input on this?

banks rules the government. that's for sure.

especially with central-bank system in place, the govt can't produce money on their own, they have to "get" (or loan, to be precise..with interest of course) from the central bank.

and if to pay that loan + interest is still by money (which again loan + interest from central bank), the govt already "brought down to its knees" by the banking system.


govt workers (no matter who he is) works for the bankers.

wages would have gone up in line with inflation! not unchanged i think

A couple of things:


1. The housing crisis was made possible ONLY because ratings agencies were put AAA ratings on sub-prime mortgages. Why did they do that? Because the banks said - put AAA on this pile of dung or we will go across the street to your competitor and pitch it to them - and will lose big fat fees.


I would suggest that calling banks welfare queens is letting them off too easily - criminal enterprises is more accurate.


2. All banks in the US and EU are immediately insolvent IF they were to follow standard mark to market accounting rules. This would mean they mark all assets at current values vs what they originally acquired them at. So the 500 million dollar mortgage on a mall built in 2005 would now be worth say 300 million. Apply that across the board and they are hopelessly bankrupt.


3. The Fed is shoveling hundreds of billions into the gaping maws of the banks at zero interest - the banks shovel it back to the US govt buying treasures and pocketing the spread - or they invest in other high risk enterprises knowing that if those go badly the taxpayer will bail them out - again.


4. Then of course there is the fact that most of these big banks were bankrupt in 2008 - and taxpayer money bailed them out.


So I am in complete agreement... the banks are the biggest welfare queens in the history of the world... they are on government life support (and flying private jets I might ad) ... while the mother of 4 is buying Kraft Dinner and wieners with a little ketchup chaser for dinner tonight.


But of course this is all justified because we can't have the banks fail... we could however have done what Sweden did in their banking crisis and nationalized them then sold them back ... but shareholders and bondholders don't like that idea... they are welfare queens too

Who runs the banks??

Traditionally all religions did not allow banking due to its ill gotten gains. They did not want anything but the funds there when they wanted it. The Bankers in turn devised many schemes to look like they were running a lean ship and they had very little profit whilst all along they were rolling in the dough. To be fair to them they had a lot to loose and they rolled the dough in their favor. Some paid for their gains with their lives, etc.

With the advent of Industrialisation they became more legitimized, they blossomed and blossomed. The success of Europe and America is as much to do with Fords, Phillips, Boeing as the banking masters - the strength of the banking masters has been that they have been and still in the shadows and still rolling the dice, loading them.

Democracy and Capitalism is the one and the same. There are no possible separation as one goes gloves in hand with the other. We have as yet not been able to think of any Socio/Economic system better than the sham we have. There is Socialism with its myriad of benefits. This would have been the ideal vehicle for our planet; hoever there seems to be no incentives for socialism to succeed as base equality is not as wonderful to have as one would have thought. We human are children of creations and destructions, disparity and gains. We in HK are the perfect examples of people enjoying the buzz of the drive that the city offers and the gains associated with this.....

The bankers are a sad sad necessity. We have to let them know that they are not as hard working as they think they are. They are not creative and superhuman as they think they are. We the general public and the GOVERNMENT needs to be smarter and be one step ahead of them, that is the only way we can keep them in check.


US$ 50K for each US person..So what is the US government doing. Zilch!

2012 – The Year of Living Dangerously


http://www.zerohedge.com/news/guest-post-2012-year-living-dangerously


Some choice excerpts:


“It seems tax cuts didn’t lift all boats, just the yachts.”


Civic decay revealed itself dramatically in 2011 as millions of young people across the country occupied parks and town squares in a fruitless effort to correctly point out how the ruthless oligarchs inhabiting Wall Street bank executive suites, Mega-corporation boardrooms, the Marriner S. Eccles Federal Reserve Board Building, and the hallways of Congress had pillaged the wealth of the middle class through inflation, taxation, fraud and outright thievery. The majority of over-medicated, lethargic, uninterested, ignorant Americans yawned at this selfless display of courage and civil disobedience as they chose to occupy lines for hours to get the latest iPad or $3 waffle-maker at Wal-Mart. Delusional, non-thinking dolts across the land watched on their 60 inch HDTVs as young protestors got clubbed, beaten, tear gassed, tasered, maced, and brutalized by paid mercenaries for the ruling oligarchy. They treated the horrific scenes of brutality as if it was just one of their 30 favorite reality TV shows like I Didn’t Know I Was Pregnant or Toddlers & Tiaras. They thought this was a new show called Mace A Millenial.


This decline temporarily boosted consumer spending, but prices are on the rise again. With the State and local governments reducing spending, do the Wall Street Ivy League economists really believe consumers will increase their consumption to 73% of GDP and reduce their savings rate to 1%? If you open your local newspaper you will see the master plan. Car dealers are offering 0% financing with nothing down for 60 months. The GMAC/Ditech/Ally Bank zombie lives as subprime auto loans are back. The “strong” auto sales are a debt financed illusion. Ashley Furniture is offering 0% financing for 50 months with no payments through Wells Fargo Bank. When the Federal Reserve provides the Wall Street banks with 0% funding, banks are willing to take big risks knowing that Uncle Ben and the naive American taxpayer will be there to bail them out when it blows up again.

If you want to understand the crisis which is not over suggest reading "all the devils are here" Bethany McLean

Bethany McLean (Author)

It is really boring book to start but much more wholesome than laying blame on one section of society.

"Hell is empty, and all the devils are here."--Shakespeare, The Tempest


I have been in banking for 24 yrs. (a Disclamer).

Agree with that recommendation


Also I believe this crisis has been many years in the making... and that it is more a symptom of a much bigger set of problems - that may be insurmountable...


That does not mean that we excuse the enablers - the select few at the very top of finance - and of course the politicians...



Probably the best 'big picture' book on the structural and moral causes of America's possibly unstoppable decline is Morris Berman's Dark Ages America http://www.amazon.com/Dark-Ages-America-Final-Empire/dp/0393058662


He pours ice water onto a shattered tooth - much of what he has to say is confronting and disturbing but there are some dark truths.... but I suspect he is quite probably right.


If anyone does pick this book up I'd be interested to hear your thoughts on it.

Another good book... well a first half of a book... is Fault Lines http://press.princeton.edu/titles/9111.html


The author does a great job explaining the fundamental problems in America and how government after government have been unable/unwilling to take the hard choices to fix them and instead has resorted to palliative solutions that have taken the form of low interest money - these have created enormous bubbles and a feeling of 'false wealth' in America... and these palliatives have failed of course... and now the government has to resort to printing money...


The second half of the book is weak... and reflects the author's position as a 'toady to the banking community'...