Anyone who hears Occupy Wall Street protestors dismissed as sore losers who want something for nothing should read Matt Taibbi’s latest blog entitled “Wall Street Isn’t Winning ? It’s Cheating.” It is Wall Street banks who are the losers who want something for nothing ? and they are getting it. Taibbi exposes the double standard that that is used to support Wall Street banks and their senior management for winning a rigged game with the cooperation of politicians who are recipients of Wall Street money.
The protestors just want a level playing field. As Taibbi writes, a level playing field would entail correcting these inequities:
Allowing banks to borrow money at no interest and lend it back to the government at 3%, mortgages to people at 4% and credit cards at 20%. Lord knows a chimp could make money under those circumstances. Yet most of the banks are “still functionally insolvent, and dependent upon bailouts and phony accounting to stay above water.”
Not letting the “free market” work when Wall Street banks overextended themselves by hundreds of billions of dollars, jacking their debt-to-equity ratios up to 35:1, and pumping trillions of dollars of toxic leverage into the system, but instead giving them handouts like the Temporary Liquidity Guarantee Program, which allows them to borrow against the government’s credit rating, while at the same time cracking down hard on individuals who miss credit card or mortgage payments.
Foreclosing on individuals “who are at fault for borrowing more than they can pay back, buying more house than they can afford, etc.,” telling them to “suck it in and cope,” when getting “something for nothing is Wall Street’s official policy.” Wall Street is accustomed to getting bailed out for its reckless speculation so it feels free to make irresponsible decisions with abandon ? the “moral hazard” problem recognized by everyone.
A system in which Warren Buffet pays a tax rate of 17.4% on taxable income of $39 million, Goldman Sachs pays 1% on $10 billion, General Motors pays zero income tax on billions of dollars of income, and Bank of America receives a tax credit of $1 billion, while a single person making between $34,500 and $83,600 pays 25% in federal income tax.
Really ? who are the pinheads and who are the patriots here?
Page Perry is an Atlanta-based law firm with over 150 years collective experience protecting investor rights and fighting Wall Street greed.