J. P. Morgan Chase Bank Quotes

See {586119} for an earlier English version of this point.

There were few if any consumer protection laws in those days and many wealthy aristocrats made their money by taking advantage of the poor. They were the landowners, bankers, financiers and often the industrialists. Shaw was a sarcastic social critic and this is a typical line he gave his upper class characters. Today, we have more controls on business and finance, and many wealthy business people have gotten that way by providing great value to the consumers and being honest. However, we still have large numbers of wealthy members of society who do make their money from the poor and middle class by unethical and often illegal means. In the aftermath of the Meltdown of 2008. hundreds of thousands of the homes of the working poor and middle class were foreclosed by the major banks forging the legal documentation for the foreclusures. Millions of consumer contracts are issued that even a PhD cannot understand the terms of without special legal and financial training. There is even a legal definition of a salesperson lying to make a sale which is so commonplace that our law excuses it and calls it "puffing". However, there has been over time, improvement over Shaw's era.

The Register was one of the most widely circulated journals of early America and Niles one of the most popular and influential journalists. Banks at the time could print their own paper money—unregulated by anyone. Often then did so knowing full well that if all the paper money they issued were presented for redemption they could not possible pay, as there was by the resolution of the bank directors not enough gold and silver to redeem all the money. Although few national leaders approved of the practice, it would have then been unthinkable and considered unconstitutional for the Federal government to interfere with a private bank’s right to print money or issue promissory notes regardless of the backing. See John Adams {615650} for a similar view.

Most of the Founding Fathers would be scandalized by the banking and finance system we have in modern times. There is not a single bank in the nation that would meet Adams’ criteria for not being a “cheat.” See {615649} for a similar view and {630666} for another quote by Adams regarding banks. Interestingly, Adams was a very conservative politician and generally supported the establishment, but banks at that time were not thought of as part of the establishment. They had a somewhat unwholesome reputation at best.

See {629122} for a secular version of this religious text.

He told the government that the bank was 7 billion Euros short, and after much soul searching, the Irish government agreed to assume the debts of the bank lest all the depositors would only get a small fraction of their deposits back. However, the real deficit that the Irish government had to cover was many times the 7 billion. This led to the complete collapse of the Irish economy. Bowe and the other bank officials maintained that they thought the deficit was only 7 billion when they told that to the government. Four years later, confidential audio tapes of some telephone conversations between Bowe and other bank officials turned up and it was clear that Bowe had picked the 7 billion number out of thin air. It was a number that Bowe thought would be large enough that the Government would have to bail the bank out, but not so large that the government officials might conclude that the bailout cost was too high and it would be better to let the bank fail. By 2013 neither Bowe or any of the other Anglo Irish Bank officials had gone to jail or even been indicted. But millions of Irish citizens had their personal and business economies destroyed. See {635438} for a reaction to the exposure of the meeting.

This was yet another warning about an area that became a major factor 4 years later in the Meltdown of 2008 and the Great Recession. The George W. Bush administration, however, rejected proposals to prevent more mortgage abuses by regulating the banks and mortgage brokerage industry more.

At this time it was 6 years after the Home Financing Crisis and the Meltdown of 2008 and despite tens of thousands of law violations by the bank, the Justice Department was finally finishing their investigations and requiring some penalties. Other negotiations with other banks were in progress, but no bank executives were going to jail for the millions they handled fraudulently, whereas a burglar who stole household goods would do jail time.

The public had been roused by the meatpacking scandal and the other exposes of the leading muckraking journalists—of which Baker was one. President Roosevelt had galvanized and led the public opinion to pressure congress and major great reforms were under way that would change America forever—see New York Times editorial {86516}.

Much if the American industrial revolution was assisted by government subsidies of one kind or another. Railroads, telegraph, armaments, foundries are just a few.

In the Great Recession thousands of bank executives of the banks that received government bailouts committed fraud and perjury providing false information under oath and foreclosing on mortgages illegally. There were so many bank felons that the Justice Department decided not to prosecute any of them and let the Banks pay relatively small fines instead. Then the banks paid the crooked employees bonuses. Paul was one of the few members of Congress who favored prosecution of all the guilty bankers regardless of the number.

Most of the Founding Fathers would be scandalized by the banking and finance system we have in modern times. See {615649} for a similar view and {615650} for another quote by Adams regarding banks. Also {630667} for an Engish quote regarding banks. Interestingly, Adams was a very conservative politician and generally supported the establishment, but banks at that time were not thought of as part of the establishment. They had a somewhat unwholesome reputation at best.

This quotation is classic as it digested the major reasons for the worst financial crises since the Great Depression into one paragraph that captured the essence of the problem. The great dispute has been ever since, who let this happen, who was supposed to stop it from happening, and who did what to correct the problem afterwards so that it would not happen again? In this situation, the Wall Street Houses had paid securities rating firms to give these bonds an AAA rating even though they were backed by very risky mortgages none of which had AAA ratings.

He was referring to Fannie Mae, the government-created. private mortage guarantee company. It was heavily regulated, and in general it met the regulatory requirements. However, the requirements were insufficient, and in the 2008 Meltdown and the Great Recession that followed, Fannie Mae itself was in such bad financial condition, that the Federal Government had bail them out or have the entire home mortgage industry fall apart.

Germany, as one of the wealthier and solvent countries in the Eurozone, as a de facto matter, had to help bail out Ireland when they bailed out the Anglo Irish Bank. See {635440}. This bank was one of many throughout the Common Market and the United States that obtained taxpayer bailouts based on information that was not correct. Merkel observed similarities of banks in the different nations in terms of their honesty, greed, and lack of ethics.