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In reply to the discussion: It's getting real hard to tell just who destroyed the economy... [View all]merrily
(45,251 posts)81. Sorry, but Clinton, Summer and Greenspan ALL worked very hard to get that veto proof majority by
lobbying Congress hard.
Ultimately, repeal collapsed the economy of the US and several other nations. It was not hollowed out by the time of the Clinton administration. As best I can determine, Carter never touched it. If you have other info, please be more specific. However, in the 1980s regulations promulgated under and pursuant to Glass Steagall were "re-interpreted."
In any event, it worked until repeal.
The former Treasury secretary, whose Clinton-era assaults on Glass-Steagall protections and opposition to the regulation of derivatives were blamed by critics for weakening safeguards against financial turbulence, withdrew his name from consideration for Feds top job.
Remarkably, the decision came exactly five years after the financial meltdown of September 2008.
http://billmoyers.c
om/2013/09/16/the-populist-rebellion-that-tripped-up-larry-summers/1. Summers blocked pre-crash regulation of Wall Street: In the 1990s, Brooksley Born, the former chair of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) under Clinton, noticed that the complex, opaque, and as-yet unregulated derivatives market was rapidly expanding, so she proposed bringing the multi-trillion dollar market under CFTC rules. (Derivatives are financial products whose value is derived from underlying numbers like interest rates or fuel prices.) Summers, who was then Deputy Treasury Secretary, didn't like that idea. He testified during a 1998 Senate hearing that derivatives regulation wasn't necessary because Wall Street could be trusted to police itself. His fierce resistance, along with that of then-Fed Chair Alan Greenspan and former Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin, foiled Born's plans. As New York Times reporter Timothy O'Brien said at the time, "They...shut her up and shut her down." Partly because of this lack of derivatives oversight, few people saw the 2007 derivatives market meltdown coming.
2. He pushed to repeal the Glass-Steagall Act: In 1999, Summers also played an important role in convincing Congress to repeal the Glass-Steagall Act of 1933, which had for decades forced banks to keep their commercial and investment activities separate. The idea behind Glass-Steagall was that banks that hold customer deposits should not be making wild bets with that money. Repeal of the law allowed commercial banks to get into the mortgage-backed securities market that came crashing down during the financial crisis. "Larry Summers helped give us the last crash," says Bart Naylor, a financial policy advocate at the consumer advocacy group Public Citizen. "He must not be allowed to operate the heavy equipment of the Fed."
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2013/07/lawrence-summers-federal-reserve-chair-financial-regulation
Gene Sperling, creator of the sequester under Obama, was also involved as was Podesta and Rubin. http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/apr/19/wall-street-deregulation-clinton-advisers-obama
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Yes, but Reagan SLASHED tax rates on the wealthy and to this day they are still slashed.
NoJusticeNoPeace
May 2015
#53
As a result of the 1981 and 1986 bills, the top income tax rate was slashed from 70% to 28%.
NoJusticeNoPeace
May 2015
#59
No one screwed the economy. The rich always keep getting richer. It's most of us who got screwed.
merrily
May 2015
#4
Raygun changed our economy by introducing the trickledown theory - the others including
jwirr
May 2015
#9
Under FDR. We had a mixed economy that created the middle class. Not the filthy rich. Do you
jwirr
May 2015
#14
When it comes to what type of government I agree. But plutocracy and democracy are not
jwirr
May 2015
#20
Then why are we talking about income inequality now? Why haven't we been talking about it all
jwirr
May 2015
#33
I'm sure people have always talked about it. They just didn't necessarily used that term.
merrily
May 2015
#45
The campaign money and lobbying is definitely a BIG problem. I think what you are calling a
jwirr
May 2015
#50
I think we are, but I would call it big business, since a mom and pop can be incorporated and a
merrily
May 2015
#56
I know. We us the word corporate to mean so many things. A lot of small family farmers
jwirr
May 2015
#67
I wish Bernie could scare them but he needs a lot of us at his back. And he looks so gentle.
jwirr
May 2015
#72
I use the words trickle down because I do not know what else to call the economic theory that
jwirr
May 2015
#52
I do agree that it has always been here and I suspect that it can be found in the history of a lot
jwirr
May 2015
#69
The economy started declining with computers, and Americans liking transistor radios and VW Beetles.
Hoyt
May 2015
#17
Not trading among ourselves sure isn't stopping it, either. Thing is, what will?
merrily
May 2015
#37
It's funny you say we must look to Scandinavia, then rule out Sanders in the next breath.
merrily
May 2015
#46
Regan and the Republicans have done a masterful job of fucking the middle and lower class.
NCTraveler
May 2015
#18
Use the r word all you want. NAFTA, repeal of Glass Steagall. No, he wasn't the only one, but
merrily
May 2015
#21
Sorry, but Clinton, Summer and Greenspan ALL worked very hard to get that veto proof majority by
merrily
May 2015
#81
There is quite a difference between "ruined the economy" and "the TPP will ruin the economy".
djean111
May 2015
#23
Well, by politicians. I have this crazy idea we voters are also part of the party.
merrily
May 2015
#30
Who cares what labor wants? Republicans have made them out to be bad guys and
liberal_at_heart
May 2015
#75
I have no idea what that means. Besides, jailing people after the economies of several nations
merrily
May 2015
#82
Reagan. Where economics is concerned, he was Morgoth to GW Bush's Sauron.
True Blue Door
May 2015
#40
Big money destroyed the economy. It now costs more than $1 billion to buy the job of president.
lumberjack_jeff
May 2015
#47
The issue which has swept down the centuries and which will have to be fought sooner or later
Tierra_y_Libertad
May 2015
#83