It depends on the bank. I like my local credit union. But I have issues with some of the bigger ones, some personal experiences that I’ll keep to myself.

Look at Wells Fargo. Opening accounts for people they didn’t ask for.

Let’s look at the biggest egg producers in this country. While they inflated the prices due to the recent avian flu shortage, they made record profits. So they doubled the cost when they didn’t have to.

Our local Utility has jacked up natural gas costs. And doubled their profit.

An epipen, whose manufacturing cost is about twenty bucks, costs several hundred dollars retail. Insulin, same thing. Why? Whatever the market will bear. And it will bear a lot if you need it to stay alive. But it is not ethical, in my opinion, to so vastly over charge for medicine so someone can buy a beach house.

It’s wrong.

Profit is good. It drives our economy.

Greed is bad, it literally kills people.

Adam Smith discussed this. Unregulated Capitalism results in the abuse of capitalism. See Enron, et. al.

Yeah, let’s keep the personal attacks out of this discussion. It is hard enough to express our viewpoints via this medium.

Any economic system can be exploited by the smart and un-ethical. So there must be some sort of control to keep it going, otherwise, it eventually gets destroyed.

The banks making those buiness loans you are all for are in it for profit, or “greed” as you like to say. They want more money, but in the process THEY HAVE DONE SOMETHING GOOD. Their desire for more profit has helped someone else bring their dream to reality.

That is my point.

Sure there are financial predators in the world. Greed creates the need for laws and regulations. But the profit motive also creates an economic system that encourages invention, innovation and progress. Sadly, this is a reality ER finds so unsettling he resorts to attacking me personally.

My motivations in these conversations are based on the observation of your black and white view of human nature. The good guys verses the bad guys. The righteous vs the evil. And you say I’m a cultist! Look at my first question to you on this thread. It was based on your sad rant about who “cannot be trusted.” That has been my motivation all along. To try and lead you out of the childish notion that somehow people who want more for themselves are suddenly transformed into the army of satan. And to point out Adam Smith’s articulation that when people act in self interest it so often produces benefits for the world in general. I’ve detailed many specifics on that point and how that mechanism works in the real world. But recognition of such a reality shakes up your ideological predispositions to such a degree, you are forced to resort to ad hominem attacks on the messenger.

I’ll let you wallow in your good guys vs bad guys world and no longer try to show you how pathetic it is. Happy?

I have no disagreement with your statement. At all.

I’m all for loans to start, or expand, businesses. Or mortgages for homes, a new car, etc.

I’m all in on Capitalism.

The problem ER and I are observing, is when the greed sets in. When big corporations buy small businesses and destroy them. Look at what has been going on with local newspapers. They are being bought by hedgefunds, then most of the staff is fired, and the local reporting on local stories goes away. I get better local news on social media now.

ER’s observation of the culture of the MBA as a shark is sadly accurate in all too many cases. I have witnessed this in Academia. The endowment becomes more important than the education. As tenured profs retire, they are not replaced. Adjunct teachers are brought in. Overworked and underpaid, they will never get a tenure track position. It’s one of the reasons I left academia.

If you haven’t lately, do give the movie “Wall Street” another watch. For many, Gorden Geeko is the hero.

Stick around. I enjoy these discussions and value your contributions.

If I were a psych major, I’d be tempted to think you are wracked with misgivings about some of your deepest held ideological beliefs, and you consequently feel compelled to instantly attack even the slightest criticism of them. What do they call it? A defense mechanism? Its sort of the same response displayed by a man with subconscious fears of his own lack of masculinity and heterosexuality, and who overcompensates for it by adopting a stance of uncompromising macho display and homophobic bluster.

Did it ever occur to you maybe we really don’t disagree with you all that much, but that we’re just baiting you into revealing some of your deepest held insecurities? Your response and behavior is consistent with that of a man who is suddenly realizing everything he has believed in,
his every deep-held conviction, may be a lie. In fact, it may not just be realizing you might be wrong, but that you have been deliberately conned into being wrong by precisely those who you admire and respect and wish to emulate. You have been cleverly manipulated into collaborating with your own oppressors. You may just be starting to realize that, no wonder you’re pissed off.

I don’t need to be lectured about the evils of Communism. I’ve seen it fail all over the planet, I’ve seen the damage and misery it is causing today in the few places where it does survive. And I have direct knowledge and testimony from the members of my own family who have been victimized and exiled by it. But just because you’re not a Communist doesn’t mean you have to be a saint. And anyone who shows any interest or sympathy with some aspect of Marxist thought isn’t necessarily the Antichrist. In fact, as far as I am concerned, the evils of Capitalism really aren’t all that much different, and they arise from much the same source: Some guy who thinks he’s finally learned the way things work and it therefore gives him the right to steal from everybody else who’s too dumb to see it.

Buck, you sound like you just came from a Junior Achievement pep rally.