That will never happen because the lawmakers (i.e. wealthy elite, not democratically elected representatives) will never write laws to punish themselves. As long we live in a plutocracy we have zero hope of personal accountability for these sort of criminals.
They will however pass brutal laws sentencing poor people to 35 years to life for possession, an other disgusting shit like that, but that's another story.
Look at 2007 / 2008. Wall Street nearly crash the world economy to the ground. Ecnomists estimated it cause deaths into the thousands. (30k or 300k come to mind but I can't find the reference atm.) The Obama admin for all intents and purposes pardoned Wall Street. Yet Obama is hailed as a liberal, a hero, and one of our greatest ever.
For clarity: you saying the source of the laws are wealthy "elites" that aren't in office? Meaning sone lobbyists and their patrons? Otherwise I'm confused as one can both be a selfish rich person AND a (american-style or noy) democratically elected official.
"Knowing that some people are responsible for _knowingly_ enriching themselves off of messing with the global economy leading to the global economic crisis of 2009 and, for example, hundreds of thousands to millions of excess deaths, would you support: (A) jail time and criminal accountability for all involved; or (B) a $700,000,000,000 bailout for, among other things, their next yacht fund?
If the majority answer is (A) then there's your evidence we live in a plutocracy.
I don't necessarily disagree - I was trying to establish what position the above poster had. (i.e. where they saying the decisions are being made by the officials in office or by the lobbyists or by the people hiring the lobbyists). None of those options deny a plutocracy, they just describe the means.
- Their enablers. They're the next 14%. We really don't have an acknowledgement of the existence of this group. Examples would be politicians, the majoriry of the media, etc.
- Everyone else. In 1984 this was The Proles.
The 1% v 99% lens is __all wrong__. Any discussion via that lens is all but pointless. It puts the 14% on the wrong side of the line.
I really hate the use of "elites" in this context (you're using a common usage, I just don't like it).
To be elite is something to aspire to, to admire. To be truly elite includes concepts like benevolence, compassion, a larger awareness, and a long-term perspective. Being rich and/or educated alone isn't enough to be elite. Having power is definitely not part of being elite. A malevolent dictator is not an elite, they are just a powerful jerk.
This may be yelling to hold back the tide, but I think it's a bad idea to connect concepts of "good" with concepts of "asshole"
"In political and sociological theory, the elite (French élite, from Latin eligere) are a small group of powerful people who hold a disproportionate amount of wealth, privilege, political power, or skill in a society."
Call it whatever you want. The key takeaway is the awareness of The 14% is nonexistent. The 14% is not part of the so called 99%, the 14% is on the wrong side of divide.
In most countries jails are no good to prisoners. They are used to isolate people from society, not to help people to become a better person. And society is putting tones of money to support penitentiary system.
I believe for economical crimes people who took the decision should be fined a lot and banned from taking positions where they can do the same things again. No need to isolate them from society. At least for the first time. The same for other crimes where people do not hurt or threaten to hurt other people.
>The same for other crimes where people do not hurt or threaten to hurt other people.
Isn't that the thing though? Don't these bankers actually hurt more people, and hurt them worse, than any violent criminal could? So the person who hurts one family gets jail but the one that hurts thousands "doesn't get to work in the industry" anymore? That sounds like hogwash to me.
Has everyone just forgotten about the principle of equality under the law?
No, we've just gotten really good at interpreting our contract from the late 1700s really well.
The Lucas critique, or Campbell's law, both refer to the same concept. Any metric that becomes a target is no longer a sufficient metric.
The Constitution has been our metric for 250 years. I don't have a superior alternative, but it occurs to me that we've demanded it be a literal document, but when its our own skin on the line, we suddenly forget the inconvenient parts, and contort our minds to find absolution for something we are going to do anyways.
While I agree prisons are overused, making it a purely economical matter means it's just another investment. Benefit if you get away with it vs risk of getting caught. You have to be pretty draconian to make no one take that risk.
Banning people from an activity is also hard. They can just take a position where they advise others who will make such decisions, or other loopholes.
Jail time may not be the answer, and we clearly do a bad job of making these acts a financial risk (not to mention preventing recurrence), so your suggestion is undoubtedly an improvement over current day, but I don't think we can stop there. (Not that I have better ideas yet)
I would tend to agree with you because I feel the point isn't to ruin these people's lives, but to prevent them from causing further harm. Banning them from ever working in economics and seizing a large chunk of their wealth could be effective. That being said, it would also do society some good to actually punish these people and make an example out of them. The way they are just allowed to collect a bonus and keep going, at the moment, is terrible, it only reinforce's the impression on Wall Street that they are above the law (which they effectively are). Putting them in jail, like normal people, would serve to correct that.
Well, the bankers have always had their own threat of isolation as a hole card. If you don't like my money, I know a nice place in the Alps where they are isolationists to a fault, Switzerland.
Not that I agree with the idea, but it seems to work in practice.
ZTE apparently paid bonuses to 30+ people even though that were involved in some kind of violation. I bet Wells Fargo well also pay the CEO and the board very handsomely.
As it was in 2009 where me and you and every John Q Taxpayer contributed to the yacht and private jet fund for the Wall Street execs that stole pension money from millions of Americans, tripled unemployment, caused hundreds of thousands of excess deaths in the subsequent economic downturn...
Nothing pitchforks, molotovs, and sturdy rope wouldn't solve, but I guess we're just too comfortable to do anything but passively let them f*ck us in the butt.
"dissuade" does not mean "completely prevent forever in all circumstances"
Dissuade means something more like "reduce the chances of it happening".
If the OP had written "fines do not completely prevent forever the chances of a bad thing happening" everyone would have realised that was a nonsensical bar because even putting in jail doesn't do that.
Steal a candy bar? Go to jail. Knowingly ruin someone's life? No problem. The shareholders pay for it.