high marginal rates on top earners led to Kristallnacht — that's just history, folks. that's what the books say pic.twitter.com/xQdKl3S2wB
— Simon Maloy (@SimonMaloy) May 28, 2015
Professor Krugman publishes another one of his excoriating posts on “The Insecure Americans“…
…[I]t’s startling how little room for error there is in many American lives…. for example, 3 in 10 nonelderly Americans said they had no retirement savings or pension, and that the same fraction reported going without some kind of medical care in the past year because they couldn’t afford it. Almost a quarter reported that they or a family member had experienced financial hardship in the past year.
And something that even startled me: 47 percent said that they would not have the resources to meet an unexpected expense of $400 — $400! They would have to sell something or borrow to meet that need, if they could meet it at all…
… and at the very same time, the NYTimes seems to be arguing that Tha Gubmint broke poor little much-abused Richard Fuld:
After nearly seven years of public silence, Richard S. Fuld Jr., the former chief executive of Lehman Brothers, had a lot to say.
In a rambling speech at the Marcum MicroCap Conference at the Grand Hyatt New York in Midtown Manhattan — his first public appearance since the financial crisis — Mr. Fuld offered an opinion about the Islamic State, fretted about Vladimir Putin and proposed that the economy was not nearly as healthy as the stock markets might suggest.
But while Mr. Fuld, known as “the Gorilla” of Wall Street for his brusque style, was eager to share his views about the world, he assiduously avoided talking about his role in the largest bankruptcy in United States history.
Instead, he offered insights into his views on personal topics, including love and death, and made frequent references to his resilience…
Mr. Fuld was vilified during the crisis, becoming the face of Wall Street’s excess and imprudence. However, he was unapologetic on Thursday, suggesting that Lehman could have survived if the Federal Reserve had allowed it to, and deflected blame for the crisis onto policy makers instead of bankers.
He appeared anxious at first, removing his jacket at the podium. “I haven’t done this in a while,” he said. “This is my first public event since ’08. I don’t include my wonderful time with Congress.”
Explaining the origins of the financial crisis, Mr. Fuld avoided any mention of investment banks’ eagerness to issue subprime mortgages. (Lehman had an enormous portfolio of subprime loans.)
“It’s not just one single thing,” Mr. Fuld said. “It’s all these things taken together. I refer to it as the perfect storm.”
At the root of the crisis, in his view, was the government’s push for homeownership. At the same time, hedge funds, private equity firms and sovereign wealth firms grew rapidly, supercharging the global financial system and driving up equity values, balance sheets, the volume of financial products and the need for financing, he said.
“There was very little regulation or market supervision,” Mr. Fuld said…
Hey, nobody told us that stealing was frowned upon!…
… Asked what he could have done differently, he avoided answering directly, and instead said, “I think I missed the violence of the market and how it spread from one asset class to the next. Did we do everything we could? Did we fall prey to some other agendas? I’ll leave it at that.”
In the end, Mr. Fuld seemed hung up on the fate of his own firm, not the broader crisis that its bankruptcy helped ignite.
“Please understand, not a day goes by when I don’t think about Lehman Brothers. Not a day,” he said. “I’d love to tell you I’m over it, it’s behind me. It doesn’t happen. But having said that, I do have to move on.”…
Not a single solitary day…
Friday Morning Open Thread: IncorrigiblesPost + Comments (131)