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End Bonuses For Bankers
theodp writes "NYU risk engineering prof Nassim Nicholas Taleb has a suggestion that won't sit too well with the banksters. In his NY Times op-ed, Taleb writes: 'I have a solution for the problem of bankers who take risks that threaten the general public: Eliminate bonuses.' The problem with the bonus system, Taleb explains, is that it provides an incentive to take risks: 'The asymmetric nature of the bonus (an incentive for success without a corresponding disincentive for failure) causes hidden risks to accumulate in the financial system and become a catalyst for disaster. This violates the fundamental rules of capitalism; Adam Smith himself was wary of the effect of limiting liability, a bedrock principle of the modern corporation.'"
bankers will still upset the market on purpose for bribes, much like how politicians lie to (and upset) voters because of what amounts to bribery....
How about if a corporation is awarded death penalty, all its assets would be sold,the proceeds will be distributed to the shareholders, the corporations name, ticker symbols and other trade marks will be sequestered for ever?
It is far too easy to create corporations, compared to real human beings. Corporations do not require visa/green card/work permit/citizenship to work and profit inside the USA. So we can apply the lower standard of "preponderance evidence" to award death penalty to them, not the stricter "beyond reasonable doubt".
Any corporation that is too big to fail, is too dangerous to exist. They should be executed. We bailed out the financial institutions. They technically are living due to our mercy.
Let us break up any bank that has more than 10% market share in retail banking. Any investment bank that has more than 10% market share. And reinstate Glass-Stegall act. Let us do it peacefully when we still can do it in an orderly manner. Else someday roving mobs will be pulling out chairman of Goldman Sachs hiding in sewer pipes.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
This is a fundamental property of capitalism: when a corporation gets lucky it can dominate the market so strongly that when it gets unlucky it gets bailed out by the tax payers.
When you see who holds and manages those shares and who has voting rights, you'll understand just what a predicament we're in. You're asking the people who are sitting on the money to stop writing themselves checks. They won't.
no, that's a property of a failing political system/class. Bail outs are not an automatic thing. They require the complicity of politicians and the complacency of voters.
It's not a property of capitalism. It's a property of cronyism. I'm so sick of anti-capitalists and their Che Guevera T-shirts. What do you think the guy you bought that shirt from is?
Government bailing out corporations? That's definitely not a free-market principle, and we'd all benefit if such ridiculous falsehoods weren't spouted off by every junior blogger. Whether you like capitalism or not, in a pure system a failed company fails and whatever assets it has go to its creditors.
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
This is not true.
Historically, corporations were required to be non-profit and demonstrate that their existence served the public good to be registered.
"In the United States, government chartering began to fall out of vogue in the mid-19th century. Corporate law at the time was focused on protection of the public interest, and not on the interests of corporate shareholders. Corporate charters were closely regulated by the states. Forming a corporation usually required an act of legislature. Investors generally had to be given an equal say in corporate governance, and corporations were required to comply with the purposes expressed in their charters."
You believe that the way things operate are fundamental because you were programmed to believe that by those who have been exploiting you since you were born.
I'd say that this is a property of a certain subset of capitalism where influence of the political system is treated as any other good. That is to say, buy what you can afford, at whatever price it's worth to you.
The libertarian approach is to weaken government to the point where it can no longer aid corporations in their corruption. The liberal approach is to not treat it as a free market good. I can't for the life of me figure out what the conservative approach is. Seems to be, "What's the problem again?"
You want the truthiness? You can't handle the truthiness!
The problem of "too big to fail" is simple to solve by following this principle: any bank that is too big to fail is also to big to exist. Thus any bank that receives government money must be either closed down or broken up and sold in pieces.
This is the solution proposed by Paul Volcker, and for my money it is the correct one.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
Funny how historic problems repeat themselves, and we let it. East India Company was so big and its reach so massive that it had it's own flag, its own military, and its administrative section was larger than most governments. Eventually even government officials, who were quite comfortable with someone else managing their nasty colonial duties, began to realize that they had outgrown their own britches and started systematically taking them apart.
-- "In order to have power, I must be taken seriously." -Mojo Jojo