Should the US government do anything about the financial crisis?

[Aloone_Jonez]

Should they allow the natural free market sort itself out or should the intervene?

Do you think the US government will respond in the long term by introducing more socialist economic policies?

It think the problem isn't free trade but that stocks and shares are traded to dynamically in stock exchanges, miliion doller deals can be carried out at the press of a key - something radical needs to be done to make investors more cautious when they play with money.

[Lead Head]

I'm not entirely sure on this one. I don't think the people who ran these companies should be essentially be getting away with being a total dumbass, but on the other hand I'm not entirely sure how the economy would be fairing if they didn't help.

[worker201]

I think some sort of bailout is necessary.  It's not the fuckheads who ran their companies into the ground that I'm worried about - I'm sure they'll have no problem funding their own early retirements.  It's the poor schmucks who invested in the first place who get fucked.  Since almost all of those, especially on the high-interest mortgage side, are low-income families (who probably shouldn't have been given mortgages in the first place), they'll be broken and homeless within a few months if we just allow these companies to fail.

Sure, the market would figure itself out eventually.  But it would leave a lot of dead bodies in its wake.  I think the government has a responsibility to lessen the collateral damage if it can.  Post the money for a bailout, but all the executives get minimum wage for 6 months.  That'll teach them.

The speculative hypervaluation of properties and commodities is the real fucking problem, and I don't have any idea how to solve it.  Set stock value at a percentage of the company's cash holdings, and limit speculative trading to 1 year in advance, maybe.

[davidnix71]

I know someone who works at Wendy's (do you want fries with that?). He has a wife and kid and a $3k a month mortgage. I asked him "what were you thinking?" and he didn't have an answer.

Under the failed bailout plan, the government would become the landlord and would try to negociate a mortgage that was affordable, and would recover the money when the property was sold. That's probably the least messy way out.

Foreign investors who were scammed by US banks and brokerage firms should be protected some, too, so they will be willing to invest again. Locals who were scammed have an easier time suing. Otherwise, the firms who gambled with money that wasn't theirs to gamble with should simply be allowed to fail, and the principals held personally responsible to the full extent of their assets.

Fucking up the whole world's economy for personal gain should be treated as a war crime.

It's really a shame we don't have the old USSR penal model. Anyone who stole more than about $200k was simply executed.

All adjustable rate home mortgages as well as balloon (interest payments only at the start) should be absolutely outlawed.

[Aloone_Jonez]

It's really a shame we don't have the old USSR penal model. Anyone who stole more than about $200k was simply executed.

What a legal system that protects the state from its people rather than its people from the state?

You can't be serious.

You might as will suggest that the US govermnet should adopt marxism and drive the country down the road to socialism, communism and all that bad stuff.

[SiMuLaCrUm]

See what happens. If nothing fixes it self in say, 4 or 5 months, try to fix it.
But since it is the marketers and their greed that got the economy in this mess in the first place, I think it should be their responsibility to fix it.

[worker201]

See what happens. If nothing fixes it self in say, 4 or 5 months, try to fix it.
But since it is the marketers and their greed that got the economy in this mess in the first place, I think it should be their responsibility to fix it.

Economics is a weird science.  Things you do now might have no effect for 2 years, and effects you see immediately might actually be effects of something that happened 10 years ago.  It's not like fixing a car, where if it dies on the side of the road, you just call a wrecker and take it to the shop, where they quote you a price to get it back on the road again.  Economics is more hit/miss - any bailout plan may work, or it may not.  Even if we were to come up with a super-lucky plan that guaranteed results, we still wouldn't see the benefits for 6 months.  Effectively, you're suggesting an entire year of bank runs, foreclosures, stock dives, and low-level tinkering.  Not a good idea.  Either do it now and cross your fingers, or commit to non-interference and set up a bunch of shelters.

[Refalm]

Either do it now and cross your fingers, or commit to non-interference and set up a bunch of shelters.

If the market is supposed to be natural and unpredictable, wouldn't not interfering with it be much better than a few experts trying to influence the flow of cash every day?

[WMD]

This whole bailout thing to me reeks of a child who scraped his knee and is running to mommy to make it all better.

We fucked up - now time to pay the price.  Government is not our mommy.  Besides, bailing everyone out might end up increasing future risk-taking: "It's ok, if we screw up again, we'll just ask the government for another bailout."

[worker201]

Either do it now and cross your fingers, or commit to non-interference and set up a bunch of shelters.

If the market is supposed to be natural and unpredictable, wouldn't not interfering with it be much better than a few experts trying to influence the flow of cash every day?

The subject of much debate.  I personally believe that left to its own devices, a completely unregulated market would lead to quite severe exploitation.  Slavery, serfdom, sharecropping and shantytowns are all potential products of an unregulated market.  If we wish to prevent these things (and it appears that we in fact do), then some regulation must be performed.  But how much?  In this particular case, I think the amount of damage done by non-regulation would be greater than the potential cost of regulation.  Pick a time when not so much is on the line to experiment.

[SiMuLaCrUm]

See what happens. If nothing fixes it self in say, 4 or 5 months, try to fix it.
But since it is the marketers and their greed that got the economy in this mess in the first place, I think it should be their responsibility to fix it.

Economics is a weird science.  Things you do now might have no effect for 2 years, and effects you see immediately might actually be effects of something that happened 10 years ago.  It's not like fixing a car, where if it dies on the side of the road, you just call a wrecker and take it to the shop, where they quote you a price to get it back on the road again.  Economics is more hit/miss - any bailout plan may work, or it may not.  Even if we were to come up with a super-lucky plan that guaranteed results, we still wouldn't see the benefits for 6 months.  Effectively, you're suggesting an entire year of bank runs, foreclosures, stock dives, and low-level tinkering.  Not a good idea.  Either do it now and cross your fingers, or commit to non-interference and set up a bunch of shelters.

So the butterfly effect works big time here... I see.

We fucked up - now time to pay the price.  Government is not our mommy.  Besides, bailing everyone out might end up increasing future risk-taking: "It's ok, if we screw up again, we'll just ask the government for another bailout."

Makes sense, to an extent. I don't think the government would willingly allow the economy to collapse.

[davidnix71]

I suggest the Soviet penal model because the crooks here won't commit seppuku when they get caught thieving from the people.
The Soviet economic model sucked, but if we bail out crooks, then so does ours. What has been done is treason and should be treated as such.

I didn't cheer when the planes hit the towers, but I didn't give a shit either. The dead were stock brokers and those who tried to save them. In the US public stock brokering isn't exactly an honest occupation. They make money trading on inside info (legally).

[worker201]

But fighting fires with a "save em all, let God sort em out" attitude is a pretty honest occupation.  If nothing else, we lost a lot of brave rescue workers that day.

[fishcorn]

Oh, I'm crying! A bunch of worthless blue collar boneheads who were too dumb to do anything else with their lives but shoot water at fire and follow orders like mindless drones, the type of people who would punch babies to death for no other reason than "durrr the sarge said to", the type of jingoistic idiots who keep the people who cause all of the problems in the world in power due to stupid concepts like duty and honor. If they'd survived, between them they probably would have pissed out thousands of boneheaded kids just as worthless as them. There will always be more dumbfucks to replace them though; don't worry about that.

Yeah, all of those American Bastards dying was a huge loss.

[SiMuLaCrUm]

Firefighters aren't like the ones in Fahrenheit 451. They actually do care for who they save, and don't do things just cos they are told to. I'm sure there are some out there like that, but not all.