I would think that the wrong "politics", or perhaps better said as the wrong philosophy, ultimately leads to your own demise, regardless of your acumen. I think Atlas Shrugged covers this concept well. Politics is the practical extension of philosophy. I think we are all discovering that the consequences of a disinterest in philosophy on the part of business people leads to exactly where we are now. OldTrader
Yes, Ayn Rand writes about a banker as well, but the focus of Ayn Rand's hero worship are the producers of wealth. When she wrote Atlas Shrugged and the Fountainhead, the U.S. was the worlds largest manufacturing nation. I would say that the great Industrialists of the turn of the century inspired her the most - not the bankers - the producers. Railroads are a common motif in her novels - they represent the great industrialization. I did not mean to paint Banking with a broad stroke. I think most here, given the current state of banking in our time, understand where I was going by crtitcizing the OP. d'Anconia's long winded speech reflects Rands thoughts. This speech may have been borne of her views of Bolshevism and FDR's policies, but it is still relevant today. Read this below, and think about Wall Street today: "Then you will see the rise of the men of the double standard--the men who live by force, yet count on those who live by trade to create the value of their looted money--the men who are the hitchhikers of virtue. In a moral society, these are the criminals, and the statutes are written to protect you against them. But when a society establishes criminals-by-right and looters-by-law--men who use force to seize the wealth of disarmed victims--then money becomes its creators' avenger. Such looters believe it safe to rob defenseless men, once they've passed a law to disarm them. But their loot becomes the magnet for other looters, who get it from them as they got it. Then the race goes, not to the ablest at production, but to those most ruthless at brutality. When force is the standard, the murderer wins over the pickpocket. And then that society vanishes, in a spread of ruins and slaughter. "Do you wish to know whether that day is coming? Watch money. Money is the barometer of a society's virtue. When you see that trading is done, not by consent, but by compulsion--when you see that in order to produce, you need to obtain permission from men who produce nothing--when you see that money is flowing to those who deal, not in goods, but in favors--when you see that men get richer by graft and by pull than by work, and your laws don't protect you against them, but protect them against you--when you see corruption being rewarded and honesty becoming a self-sacrifice--you may know that your society is doomed. Money is so noble a medium that is does not compete with guns and it does not make terms with brutality. It will not permit a country to survive as half-property, half-loot. "Whenever destroyers appear among men, they start by destroying money, for money is men's protection and the base of a moral existence. Destroyers seize gold and leave to its owners a counterfeit pile of paper. This kills all objective standards and delivers men into the arbitrary power of an arbitrary setter of values. Gold was an objective value, an equivalent of wealth produced. Paper is a mortgage on wealth that does not exist, backed by a gun aimed at those who are expected to produce it. Paper is a check drawn by legal looters upon an account which is not theirs: upon the virtue of the victims. Watch for the day when it bounces, marked, 'Account overdrawn.' This last paragraph I posted makes me think of the revision to Bretton Woods in 1971. Is it a coincidence that at the same time the US was becoming de-industrialized and the FIRE sector economy was mushrooming? I would say that was a watershed event that would ultimately create the concentration of power and wealth we see today.
Midas Mulligan in Rand's magnum opus was considered the most successful banker in the world. In fact, his investments funded obtaining the area called Galt's Gulch. The outside world regarded Midas as a greedy and cold-hearted bastard, because he based his investments on productive ability, not need.
A significant "cause" of the hatred for Midas was his success as well - a central theme for many of the characters.
Have you ever actually setup a business from scratch, or tried to expand one, or launch a new product or something similar? If so then you would realise you just spewed a load of garbage that has nothing to do with the real world of business. I have and I can tell you that you're just totally wrong. The vast majority of entrepreneurs view investor funding as critical to business success and growth - without it, it's incredibly difficult to grow your business quickly, many opportunities pass by the wayside, and some new business simply cannot be done at all. What happens when you have more ideas than money? Or more ideas than you can do yourself? You need employees and you need plant and premises, you have various operating expenses and you need working capital to manage supplier and customer cashflow issues. That all costs money, lots of it. Where do you think that money comes from, the tooth fairy? "Wall Street" aka the financial sector - "paper" money, money changers etc - is the sole reason that advanced economies are rich and most of the world without a functioning financial sector is not. The only reason you don't shit in a hole in the ground and rear goats or carry water from a well 2 hours a day is because of Wall Street, banks, speculators etc providing risk capital to industry and commerce, and the resulting 2 centuries of economic growth that ensued. You are spouting off on a subject you apparently have no real world experience of, yet you moan about Wall Street not being the real world. Hypocrisy, anyone? Only a very few business startups can be funded for cash, and usually then only if you were born with a silver spoon in your mouth. The vast majority of small business growth is financed by angel investors, bank finance, and later venture capital and the stock market. Take all the major US or worldwide success stories in "real" industry & commerce, and see how many didn't receive one cent of financing from those sources - you will be left with a very small list indeed. That should make it obvious as to the importance of the financial and investment sector which you are complaining about.
I agree 100%. I would also add that in my personal observation, people who don't have some core set of values usually find themselves drifting without much purposes, and ultimately degenerate into following a rather narrow and limited life driven by petty concerns and short-term self-interest. This especially happens as people get older. It's better in many cases to have a somewhat misguided set of core principles and life philosophy than it is to just "go with the flow". You can't live a purpose-driven life if you don't have any principles to give you purpose in the first place. What were John Thain's principles, what did he view his purpose in life as? Him and people like that strike me more as political operators who climbed the corporate ladder, rather than real businessmen who understand and value their role in the advancement of commerce and progress.
Why, in your view, would rational businessmen pay large fees to someone year after year for "adding no value whatsoever"? If they are paying that much consistently, than either they have been duped for the last few thousand years, or they actually do think they are getting value. Which do you think it is, and why?
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Apparently you have not read my subsequent posts. I admitted to painting banking with a broad brush - but I also understand our times and that people would "get" who I was referring to. I was responding in particular to the people the OP was referring to. Those that work for defunct companies. The loser gamblers. And I am not criticizing all banking or all speculation. I even mentioned how my grandfather, almost one hundred years ago engaged in what amounted to futures contracts to his benefit. This in a tiny poor village in the Mediterranean. Good for him. And yes, I have run my own business. Don't change the topic. Please enlighten us on how hugely unsuccessful yet somehow indespensable businesses need taxpayer money to socialize risk. And spare me your sanctimonious BS tone. I wholeheartedly agree with your description of capital and investment and business. What the hell does that have to do with what we are discussing here? Did anyone here state that we should abolish all banking and adopt a barter system? You sound to me like one of those Evangelists that starts quoting Jesus after being caught doing very un-Jesus type things. (I'm an agnostic btw)