[omegaman]

Originally Posted by Captain Tom Coughlin

The bailouts were a pretty good example. We take the risk of failing out of the equation because we are afraid of the consequences. The market said those banks should die, if this was pure Capitalisim they would have been allowed to die.

I tend to agree: If a company can't survive on its own it shouldn't be propped up by any means. The only problem is the number of employees that end up without a job and can't find another, and are forced onto welfare becoming a strain on the Federal Government.

[horatio]

That might be so in the case of an ordinary company but not so in the case of Lehman or any other giant bank going bankrupt.
I will never understand why people deny the existence of externalities. Must be all the propaganda produced by corporate-financed think tanks that makes people believe that Econ 101 is a leftist conspiracy.

[kevin]

I'm no economist and I don't claim to be but I tend to agree with Horatio here.

If there's going to be a limited or manageable fallout from a private venture collapsing then that's fine. The problem was how large, intertwined and interconnected the big (BIG) banks and financial institutions became into the economies not just of their 'own' countries but the rest of the world. A Domino effect is then risked.

That's why billions (or is it trillions now? I lose track) was pumped into them. I can realise that and understand that.

But.............

I think it's deplorable that these guys took all the various countries public money they could eat up and STILL want to carry on their business as if nothing ever happened - eat the cake and then have it, so to speak (but then the guys at the top are so far removed from the 'reality' the bulk of us face of course they think they can go on as if nothing happened) - and so the effect is that despite agreeing with Horatio in principle I'm kinda finding myself getting more militantly indigant against these guys. I am guilty of feeling fed up and angry with them.

And I still have a job and can pretty much cover myself (for now, although my employer is like everyone else trying to find ways to screw you) so I'm not even as bad off as some others.

But I'm at the point now where I AM thinking a little bit like Tom and saying to myself 'I don't want my taxpayer's money to be used anymore to bail them out. These organisations don't deserve it'.

Let them collapse.