- #176
turbo
Gold Member
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- 56
It was not a free-market collapse. It was a confluence of crooks and gamblers gaming the system while regulators looked away, PLUS Fed officials making sure that the crooks and gamblers could get access to our money for next to nothing. In return, people like myself who have saved all our lives and wanted to use interest on our savings to supplement our retirement were and are still getting screwed. Banks, credit unions, and investment firms pay next-to-nothing in interest because they don't have to. Unless the Fed tightens up the money faucet by increasing interest rates, we will still get screwed. The Greenspan/Bernanke philosophy of keeping money free for Wall Street is responsible in part for the concentration of wealth at the top and the pressure on the middle-class, poor, and retirees. Lest anyone make any idealogical inferences regarding my identification of culprits, BOTH major political parties are complicit in this pandering to the wealthy and powerful.MECHster said:Denying the obvious? Oh come on. Without the government policies which let those banks gamble with other people's money, they would have never acted as they did. The government was responsible to pay all of the "bets" the banks lost. The banks really had nothing to lose by taking advantage of the system. If they lost the bet, the government paid for it, if they won, they got paid, if the system collapses, they get bailed out. In all scenarios the government was a major player. Also, without the bail out, the banks would be MUCH more cautious in their "bets". Even if everything I just said is completely wrong, watch this video in which people who know more economics than you or I will ever know disagree with you. Even if you disagree with them, at least acknowledge the possibility of it NOT being a free-market collapse.
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