Recently it was said that, “corporations are people too!” But, faceless corporations aren’t going to seem like real people until we begin seeing real people held to account for our current financial disaster.
Today’s economy can be traced directly back to the greed, ineptitude and malfeasance of this century’s robber barons – the financial institutions. Yes, 2008 was the tipping point but it didn’t start there. It began in the 80s when the government loosened the tight reins of bank regulation in place since the 30s for a reason. Yes, the great depression of the 20th century can be traced directly to financial institutions allowed to run amuck just as they do now.
After 50 years of pent-up greed, once the government freed them from their regulatory shackles, it didn’t take long for the savings and loan crisis to happen. That was our wake-up call and we missed it. We, the people, not the “corporations” cleaned that one up too. And, we’ll be cleaning up the next mess because their getting away with it. It’s three years now and they’re still operating as though their only responsibilities are to themselves.
Like a perfect sacrifice, we the people were given to the banks in the 80s. Our future financial lives intertwined with theirs through our retirement plans. Today, we’re all bound up in their web, held hostage by our 401ks!
We’ve all attended multiple meaningless HR meetings where we mindlessly chose which funds would get our money. What a joke! Most of us could barely balance our checkbooks let alone choose the right stock fund. Turns out even the executives at the top couldn’t understand the machinations of the bundled worthless funds that caused the crash of 2008.
Truth is banks don’t have any money unless they have our money – the people’s money. As stewards of our money, they were required to recognize and honor their fiduciary responsibility to us - their depositors. But that’s not what happened. Their greed pushed them to further and further risk our money until they brought the country down. We were totally naive to allow so much power to be concentrated in their hands and we’re all paying for our apathy and ignorance!
Those of retirement age, like me, will experience a different last phase of life than long dreamed. Younger people struggling to get a toehold on a career and financial life are also going to have different lives then they imagined. Yet, the financial institutions responsible for all this misery are still running amuck without consequences. As for the “corporations are people too” business, it’s meant to confuse us. That works well for the new robber barons. If we’re confused we’ll blame each other instead of them.
What I’m not confused about is that banks without regulations and without regulation enforcement will operate to protect their executives and directors rather than their depositors. Today we have no meaningful fix in site and no accountability either.
Coastal Area Living in Hampstead & Wilmington, NC 910-279-9794www.CoastalAreaLiving.com
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