Dean Baker: Geithner's Plan Will Tax Main Street to Make Wall Street Richer

t r u t h o u t | Geithner's Plan Will Tax Main Street to Make Wall Street Richer.(excerpt; read the whole thing)

Oh, by the way, some people will get very rich off the Geithner plan. Some hedge and equity fund managers could make hundreds of millions or even billions off the Geithner plan. And, under current law, they will pay a lower tax rate on this money than a schoolteacher or firefighter. Are you sold yet?

One other outcome of the Geithner plan is that the folks who bankrupted their banks and wrecked the economy will be able to continue to earn multi-million dollar salaries. Of course this is necessary, because who else has the skills to run these banks, other than the people who drove them into bankruptcy?

For some reason, every plan the EMHB have developed so far involves using taxpayer dollars to subsidize the bankrupt banks and keep them breathing a little bit longer, while offering opportunities for other Wall Street actors to get hugely wealthy. Some people say that the EMHB keep coming up with plans that enrich the Wall Street crew because they are so closely tied to the Wall Street financial interests.

It is, of course, possible that the EMHB are too closely tied to the financial industry, but it's also possible that they just lack the creativity and imagination to think of a plan that doesn't enrich the Wall Street crew. After all, these people lacked the ability to see an $8 trillion housing bubble, the largest financial bubble in the history of the world.

Comments

[Ted Bagley]

The president is the representative of the State. The State is corporatist.
It's also possible that the President is working hard so people have faith in the Presidents position to save them. That way they'll want to vote next election instead of revolt.