Sunday, May 9, 2010

Robert Reich Makes a Compelling Argument for REGULATING Wall Street

Here is a long quote from his recent article, "The (Almost) Crash of Wall Street" posted at Alternet in response to last Thursday's (temporary) market crash of 1000 points:
http://www.alternet.org/environment/146790/robert_reich%3A_the_%28almost%29_crash_of_wall_street
"Regardless of why it happened, it's further evidence that the nation's and the world's capital markets have become a vast out-of-control casino in which fortunes can be made or lost in an instant -- which would be fine except for the fact that most of us have put our life savings there. Pension funds, mutual funds, school endowments -- the value of all of this depends on a mechanism that can lose a trillion dollars in minutes without anyone having a clear idea why. So much of the market now depends on computer programs and mathematical models that no one fully understands, so much trading is in the hands of a few people whose fat thumbs or momentary carelessness might sink the economy, so much of global wealth now depends on who can move their money quickest at the slightest provocation -- that we are toying with financial disaster every day. The luck or foolishness of a few traders, and inside knowledge and information that some possess and others don't, combined with ultra high-speed computers, put us all at the whim of a system whose risk is way out of proportion to any public benefits..."

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