Paul Krugman reviews the movie: “The Big Short.”
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Krugman ponders the big question: Why was no one charged or prosecuted for these scams whereby the working class, once again, are turned upside down and stripped of their possessions for the benefit of the fraudsters, those who we call bankers? You know, those benevolent creatures who committed blatant fraud, knew it was fraudulent, knew that people would be harmed by it, knew that the homes they were financing were overvalued, knew that the rating agencies were also committing fraud, knew that the loans they were issuing were not payable by those receiving them, knew that these properties would go into foreclosure and sold for big discounts after the working homeowners were evicted, and knew that they could then buy them from the issuing banks and rent them to the defrauded homeowners. That might be what some of us call a double whammy, maybe a triple whammy. The triple whammy came about when we the people came in and bailed out the fraudulent bankers and then forced them to accept interest free loans of billions of dollars so they could make loans to us at exorbitant rates, with our money, no less.
Actually, this may be a quadruple whammy, since they packaged these loans into securities like week-old fish, and sold them to unsuspecting investors, then “Shorted” the securities they sold. A perfect crime.
The may be what Jack Nicholson would call : “As Good as it Gets.”
No one would even have the imagination to make this story up. It is too preposterous.
Go figure.