[TravisLS]

That's a fair point given the way I phrased my reply, but TARP is far from the extent of the cost of the financial crisis. The resulting market crash, credit crunch, unemployment all play a role in making this much more than a private issue. The fed estimated the cost to each American at $20-80K. [1] Also TARP could have very easily not made money, and bailouts are certainly not guaranteed to make money the next time around.

[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/22/business/economy/the-cost...

[guntars]

That's fair too, though it's easy to blame all of the recession on the subprime bubble bursting while I think it would have happened anyway, eventually. And I'm advocating for letting banks, funds and investors fail if they lose at the game of musical chairs. For this to work though they need to be kept separate from rest of the finance system and use their own money.

[TravisLS]

I'm agreed with you on that point. I wish we lived in that world and I think we should work harder to get there. As long as we don't, though, I'm resigned to recognizing the public costs of these private failures.