Re: Occupy America Ever heard of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, or the scandal that lead to it? It's not as easy to sweep illegal profits under the rug as it used to be. Sure, it happens much more often than it should, and it's difficult to catch, but that doesn't mean there shouldn't be an investigation into abnormal profits, or in situations where fraud is suspected. I'm not asking for perfect, I'm just saying there needs to be closer examination and some level of accountability. The idea that the feds shouldn't even investigate where profits are suspected to be illegal is asking for this country to spiral downward real fast.
Re: Occupy America Reading what people wrote about their shitty lives pisses me off to no end. It's their fault they are that way, not anyone elses. Like that one guy who blamed the Bank of America for his family loosing their house and him having to live out of his car. It's not the banks fault, it's yours for not paying your fucking mortgage. Alot of these people bitch and believe they deserve $50k/yr jobs out of college with their degree in basket weaving. These people have to be willing to see how much a waste most college degrees are and choose to work hard, from picking oats out of horse shit, to digging ditches to being mechanics/electricians etc. I have absolutely ZERO sympathy for these people. It's their fault they are in the situation they are in. Fuck them.
Re: Occupy America I don't know about you, but letting a megabank fail that controls that much money seems like a recipe for disaster for the rest of the economy.
Re: Occupy America Bailing them out is a short term bandaid. Why did they fail? The problem is that, like I stated before, no one really fucking knows. It is easier to just throw money at the problem instead of fixing it.
Re: Occupy America I get that there's a lot of spoiled brat types among those 99% posts, but what about the guy who died because his company cut corners on safety regulations? Or the guy whose house is foreclosed on by a big bank despite the fact that he owns the house free and clear and never had a mortgage in the first place? Or the guy who works for the same company for thirty five years, and then upon approaching retirement finds out his company's pension fund has lost half its value because, despite everything they invested in being rated AAA, the banks were shoveling pure horseshit with faulty ratings? There is much more going on here than just some kids that don't want to pay their student loans.
Re: Occupy America Are you serious? People don't like it because it's fucking up our country. You really don't have a problem with our corporations struggling to compete internationally because of terrible management like this? I agree with this, but often times letting the losers just lose means thousands of people are getting put out of work. It can also mean our country falling way behind, or completely out of a key industry. This should usually be the case, but it's not always that simple. If recovery seems to be a possibility, a bail out should at least be considered. I agree with 90% of what you are saying, but I think sometimes when looking at issues like this it's too easy to oversimplify and become short sighted.
Re: Occupy America I wouldn't be surprised to hear the genesis of these protests started when the US government was gushing over the Tunisia and Egypt protests. Young educated people with little future prospects, gathering together through mass social media, pissed about the way their government is run, and feeling they have no control over their lives. Granted, I'm in no way saying the two are similar in principle or cause, but the idea was certainly sparked that with civil unrest, change is brought. It took less than a month of constant protest and unrest to topple a government. I think people in this country were empowered by that idea which led to the OWS protests. They also saw their own government supporting the idea that change can come through this sort of peaceful revolt and they are hoping the same can happen in this country. As far as the actual reasons behind the protests, some things I support, some I disagree with. I don't think taxing the rich is the answer to the problems with our country affording all of the programs it has on the books. I do believe that a complete reform of the education system is in order. I do believe our tax code could be greatly simplified. I do think the influence corporations and lobbyists have on our government has gotten to levels of corruption and backdoor dealing that has basically caused a political standstill that doesn't look like it's going to break anytime soon. As a whole I'd say the protests are a good thing if they bring about beneficial change to our country. The odds of it happening aren't extremely good. There is too much money at stake from all interested parties where ordinary citizens don't have much of a chance for peaceful revolt to better their own lives.
Re: Occupy America No, no, you misunderstand. As in, once they are busted for a crime, then you audit to determine how much the penalties should be. This is complete hyperbole. You could cover the entire National Intelliegnce Program Budget of the USA if you were to tax Bill Gates, net worth $60 billion, at 100%. It's not a good idea, but it'd fund that budget. The problem's both taxes and spending. Why don't we raise taxes on those who can handle it, and decrease spending on things we don't benefit enough from?
Re: Occupy America My dad would think you're right. When all these protests in N Africa and unrest in the Middle East (actual civil protests, not the usual stuff) started, my dad was worried that it would spread to the US. While my thought was that Gaddafi was corrupt and the people, through peaceful protest, were earning the change that they sought, my dad was worried because it is easy for 1: these things to spread to other countries (including us), and 2: for them to turn violent. As much as he wants things to get better, he also doesn't want the boat rocked too hard.
Re: Occupy America You can't get rid of personal responsibility. A bank isn't a magical entity that is everlasting and can't fail. It's an investment firm that secures the money of those banking there and invests that money responsibly. If it doesn't invest responsibly, it's up to the depositors to do the research and choose whether or not to bank there. A bank that has even a smallish portion of its depositors remove their money because of shoddy investments will learn really damn quick to not make shoddy investments. People need to learn personal responsibility with their own money. They need to know that the money is permanent and that there are many upon many ways to lose it. Why it failed is relatively simple. Banks were forced under penalty of charter revocation to make shoddy loans. Realizing how shoddy they were, they decided to sell "Securities" backed by the amount of money the loans would (may) bring in. They sold these "Securities" to other investment firms and private citizens. With more and more demand being artificially driven up from the piles of loans being given out to anyone, the price of homes skyrocketed. When people were not able to pay the loans, and they realized that the price of the homes far exceeded the real value, and the entire thing collapsed. What should have happened is that the banks should have told the government to go pound salt instead of giving loans to people who couldn't pay them. Lesson Learned. What should have happened is that private investors and banks should have asked what a security actually was, and told those who were selling them to go pound salt. Lesson Learned. What should not have happened is anyone being bailed out for their mistakes. I have the slightest sympathy for the banks (not the people), but that's because they didn't know they could have told the government to get fucked.
Re: Occupy America You know what people called SOX in my accounting classes? The "No Child Left Behind" of the accounting world. Lots of paperwork, not much results. It's a nice symbol for the government to say "Hey! Look at us! We're doing stuff! All by ourselves!" If you think it's actually made anyone in corporate governance any more culpable, accountable or liable in any way, then you're naive beyond redemption.
Re: Occupy America Is this something that actually happened? Legit question. Edit: Never mind, I remember seeing this, if I remember correctly he shut down an office branch and took its furniture or something. He gets the same benefit, because that's how defined benefit plans work, the investment risk is completely on the company. Worst case scenario the plan goes belly up and he still gets $48,600 a year at age 65 from the PBGC. And there aren't many non-governmental plans out there that offer that kind of benefit for a median wage worker for 35 years.
Re: Occupy America Zero Accountability. Is that what we are getting at? People shouldn't be accountable for their actions? The people that work at a company are responsible for knowing what their company does and if they do it well. If they are not doing well, and they know it or they should have known it, there is no one else to blame when they are out of a job when the company fails. It's happened a couple times. They always get their house back. In one case the house owner actually foreclosed on the bank after winning the costs of court defenses in the lawsuit and the bank never paid.
Re: Occupy America Yeah it happened. It was Bank of America if I remember correctly, and now the guy is going to get upwards of 20 million or something like that out of it.
Re: Occupy America Cool story bro. I took that class too. There has been a lot written about the effects of SOX, and a lot of studies/papers suggest American companies have become more transparent. Others rightfully say that it still falls short on it's goals. I never claimed it was a cure all, nor did I say it comes even close to solving the problem. At least SOX is an attempt to working forward and finding a solution. Basically your answer is to just ignore the problem since it's impossible to do anything about it. Good for you. Glad you aren't running the country. I'm not saying zero accountability. I'm not even saying there should be a bail out in most cases, just in situations where success in the industry is vital to the country's well being, where a recovery seems to be a strong possibility, and when we can save thousands of jobs. Also, it's easy to say people should always know how their company is doing, but that can be very difficult to predict at times. If you can predict how companies will always do you can retire very early and very rich.
Re: Occupy America "People shouldn't be accountable for their actions?" You think that's what people are angry about? Why aren't corporations accountable as accountable as people are for their actions? They pay a paltry fine, or nothing at all, and get off with shit that a private individual would get life in prison for. People aren't necessary losing their job because the company fails. They're losing their jobs because the company doesn't want to pay that many employees anymore, or they want to move somewhere cheaper, or they want to liquidate the assets and make a quick buck.
Re: Occupy America The only things an event such as this reveals are the biases and beliefs of the person telling you about it. Edit: Re-reading that, it sounds a little more high and mighty than I meant for it to. But it does sum up what I think about this whole movement, or whatever you'd like to call it. And I don't just mean people on this thread, or the news media, but also people participating in the protests themselves. In Houston, the bus driver's have joined the OWS Houston edition. The freaking bus drivers?? I'm sure many of those folks have been hard hit by the current recession, but they're also the recipients of many forms of government patronage and mismanagement that -- broadly construed -- the OWS folks can be seen to be actively fighting.
Re: Occupy America Yeah, the story is kind of awesome. They foreclosed, he (counter)sued saying "Uh... that's my fucking house," won the case and BoA was ordered to pay his legal fees. They refused to pay him over a period of five months, so he got the court to foreclose on them, and he went down to the local branch with the local sheriff and foreclosed on the branch. Started loading up desks, computers, emptied the tellers, etc. They basically were halfway through a bank robbery with the local sheriff as their muscle when the bank sorted its shit out and cut them a check for the amount owed. That's a story where the little guy won (in large part because he was so indisputably in the right and had the resources to afford representation). There are plenty more cases where banks have foreclosed on houses without holding the mortgage that didn't have such a badass ending. There's also thisfucked up story, although it's more a tragedy of errors than a big conspiracy. Still, the bank fucked up pretty bad and the little guy paid for it.