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The Real Cost of the 2008 Financial Crisis

newyorker.com

161–170 of 404 posts

Re: The Real Cost of the 2008 Financial Crisis

#161

While a generally fascinating piece that connects together the events in the American and European financial and political systems, it shouldn't be understated how much of an effect the refugee crisis is having on European politics, which can be attributed largely to the "Arab Spring"; itself largely a consequence of the 2008 financial crisis.

I can't help but believe that if the common folk of Europe of the last, say 10 years, was doing economically better, they would have been more generous with people fleeing warzones looking for help...

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Re: The Real Cost of the 2008 Financial Crisis

#162

The best explanation I have heard of the financial crisis was in the book "The End of Alchemy: Money, Banking and the Future of the Global Economy" by the former head of Bank of England. It makes the convincing case that there is no real single place to point fingers and that the crash was the logical consequence of people all doing the "right thing" I can highly recommend it as it also takes a historical view of mon…

I can point to all the underwriters that approved loans with no income verification, fraudulent paperwork, officially stating they did checks for a physically impossible number of mortgages.

There was some clearer signs before the crisis that things were not going according to plan.

I remember hearing about the subprimes one or two years before the crisis (and I'm nowhere near the financial fields).

Also, the amount of money/loans put in circulation was excessive. Basically the monetary mass growth should more or less be equal to inflation+economic growth. It was far exceeding this values at the time. And what is worrying is that quantitative easing is basically that on steroids.

Re: The Real Cost of the 2008 Financial Crisis

#163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Mixed with that and the liberal social welfare system in Europe and PC culture which claimed any critical voice was facist, racist etc. That's why the antiestablishment came about not because of 2008 and wallstreet." Oh come on, this is ridiculous. Pointing out fascism and racism doesn't turn people fascist or racist. If you think there aren't some problems with racism and fascists I don't know what to tell you, bec…

>> Pointing out fascism and racism doesn't turn people fascist or racist. First of all you're slightly modifying OP's comment. He was not talking about actual fascism or racism that was pointed out, but about the abuse of those terms to silence critics regardless if they were racists or not. If this kind of qualification is used purely a means to silence critics and it is used repeatedly without proper justification…

"First of all you're slightly modifying OP's comment. He was not talking about actual fascism or racism that was pointed out, but about the abuse of those terms to silence critics regardless if they were racists or not."

Most of the time they are what they are being called.

Ha, again, calling someone racist doesn't turn them racist, makes absolutely zero sense.

Re: The Real Cost of the 2008 Financial Crisis

#164
post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Confidence in the market , and preventing panic was the highest priority, which is why no bank executive was punished in any meaningful way. Frontline did a great piece on this, which I watched years ago. Not sure if this is it: https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/film/meltdown/ I believe it also explains why the election hacking of 2016 wasn't and isn't being addressed fully. If the US were to admit actual votes were…

When people who know what they're talking about talk about "election hacking," they know that no actual hacking took place. They were Facebook ads. That's it.

That's a straight up lie.

Re: The Real Cost of the 2008 Financial Crisis

#165
post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Throwing the bad guys in jail would have spurred even more confidence in the market. The same guys are still in charge.

"The same guys are still in charge" The problem is, there are no "other guys".

There are always other guys.

Re: The Real Cost of the 2008 Financial Crisis

#166
post #41
post #2

But what was the alternative to the bailouts? Another depression? I feel we made it across fairly well.

The bailouts are controversial, but it's the bailouts AND the complete absence of criminal responsibility that's inexcusable. It is well known and documented that the financial crisis was no accident; everybody who headed the financial services industry to the state it was in did so knowingly , knowing full well the inevitable consequences, but not giving a damn because the arrangement let them to become handsomely w…

I hope this doesn't come across as me trying to justify what happened but can anyone be explicitly about what laws were broken and who should have gone to jail? I know there was a bunch of outrage but want to cut through all that and get at exactly the issue.

Re: The Real Cost of the 2008 Financial Crisis

#167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Mixed with that and the liberal social welfare system in Europe and PC culture which claimed any critical voice was facist, racist etc. That's why the antiestablishment came about not because of 2008 and wallstreet." Oh come on, this is ridiculous. Pointing out fascism and racism doesn't turn people fascist or racist. If you think there aren't some problems with racism and fascists I don't know what to tell you, bec…

>> Pointing out fascism and racism doesn't turn people fascist or racist. First of all you're slightly modifying OP's comment. He was not talking about actual fascism or racism that was pointed out, but about the abuse of those terms to silence critics regardless if they were racists or not. If this kind of qualification is used purely a means to silence critics and it is used repeatedly without proper justification…

The comment from mercurysmessage is even a good example of shame being used to silence dissent, which is ironic considering that the conversation was about shame being used to silence dissent.

mercurysmessage shamed you, by implicitly calling you a racist, for being of the opinion that people who were not racist were shamed by being called racist.

Re: The Real Cost of the 2008 Financial Crisis

#168
post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The bailouts are controversial, but it's the bailouts AND the complete absence of criminal responsibility that's inexcusable. It is well known and documented that the financial crisis was no accident; everybody who headed the financial services industry to the state it was in did so knowingly , knowing full well the inevitable consequences, but not giving a damn because the arrangement let them to become handsomely w…

> Then while we (working class) were dealing with the fallout On the ground, parts of the financial services and the "working class" were responsible. This story that it was simply a bunch of innocent people trying to fulfill the American Dream of owning a home is hogwash. People were knowingly buying property beyond what they could afford because prices would "always go up" and they could flip it to a greater fool.…

One person asks for the loan, another person approves and gives it.

Lenders were giving NINJA loans left and right, and stacked credit rating agencies to give them fake scores to sell off bad mortgages before the grenade went off.

Re: The Real Cost of the 2008 Financial Crisis

#169
post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The bailouts are controversial, but it's the bailouts AND the complete absence of criminal responsibility that's inexcusable. It is well known and documented that the financial crisis was no accident; everybody who headed the financial services industry to the state it was in did so knowingly , knowing full well the inevitable consequences, but not giving a damn because the arrangement let them to become handsomely w…

I hope this doesn't come across as me trying to justify what happened but can anyone be explicitly about what laws were broken and who should have gone to jail? I know there was a bunch of outrage but want to cut through all that and get at exactly the issue.

A lot of lower level mortgage brokers clearly committed fraud in the applications they processed. There may be some criminal or civil negligence by middle management by ignoring the fraud in an attempt to meet quotas. Unfortunately, it's hard to pin much of anything on the higher level executives.

Re: The Real Cost of the 2008 Financial Crisis

#170
post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The bailouts are controversial, but it's the bailouts AND the complete absence of criminal responsibility that's inexcusable. It is well known and documented that the financial crisis was no accident; everybody who headed the financial services industry to the state it was in did so knowingly , knowing full well the inevitable consequences, but not giving a damn because the arrangement let them to become handsomely w…

I hope this doesn't come across as me trying to justify what happened but can anyone be explicitly about what laws were broken and who should have gone to jail? I know there was a bunch of outrage but want to cut through all that and get at exactly the issue.

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