[bruinjoe]

This is so true. The younger generation got hosed because the older generation screwed up in a big way. Our country had a chance to clean house during the 2008 financial melt down. The big banks failing would have caused a horrible economy but we would've flushed Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, Bank of America, AIG, and a host of other leaches down the drain. Check out the historical prices of Goldman Sachs from 2007 to late 2008 if you don't believe me. The market was anticipating the bankruptcy of Goldman Sachs and this company is supposed to be the pillar of Wall Street.

Our economy would have recovered by now but we live in an even more distorted world. Risk is not priced correctly because interest rates are too low. Take Amazon for example. They can borrow at low rates to acquire an overpriced company in Whole Foods. Had Amazon borrowed at say 8% then the transaction is a lot riskier. This miss pricing of risk is radically distorting the economy throughout the country and there will be bad consequences. Those at the bottom of the economy will have the worst time and that includes recent high school and college graduates who will be looking for the few entry level positions.

[graedus]

The massive cost of the great financial crisis to everyone except the financial elite is deeply underappreciated by most people. High finance and central bank operations (QE etc) are generally perceived as both dauntingly incomprehensible and deathly boring so most people don't bother trying to understand them. Even more unfortunately, the effect of it all on everyone's day-to-day lives is sufficiently indirect and diffuse that most people do not connect the dots.

[sametmax]

There is also the apparent complexity of the system and the discourse from people talking about it that you don't know what you are talking about. Then a lot of jargon to cover it all.

But the reality is, while it's true the internals of the finance system is complex, the big picture is not. You have a bunch of people trying to make money no matter the cost, and some other people helping them not paying the cost when it fails. And they are faster and more powerful than the people trying to prevent them.

They are not genius mastermind. They are not evil people neither. Just regular humans wanting more and caring less.

[altotrees]

Too Big to Fail by Andrew Ross Sorkin only helped me to start appreciating this. It is incomprehensible that lots of the same folks are still in leadership positions. Follow the money, indeed.