[itopaloglu83]

> You can’t socialize losses and privatize gains.

Yes, yes, and yes.

We kept doing this, a bank or company stretches too much after making record profits, and then cries for federal funding and free money.

The federal reserve is a lender of last resort and they shouldn’t have given that much money without any collateral etc. Even if they just kept the stock and then sold it afterwards, we wouldn’t be in this much debt. We spend trillions covering private losses, this was plain stupid.

[JumpCrisscross]

> federal reserve is a lender of last resort and they shouldn’t have given that much money without any collateral

The Fed only lends against collateral.

[bdangubic]

easiest way to get downvoted on HN is to point out that we are the largest socialist country on the planet exactly because of this. there isn’t any shit we won’t socialize losses on (farming, banking… you name it, US has got your back)

[satvikpendem]

Socializing is not the same as socialist per se, the latter of which has the specific definition of workers controlling the means of production, and I don't see that anywhere in the US much less the world.

[bdangubic]

you can throw any semantics at this you want and re-define it however you see fit. but there are few things more socialist than government taking a stake in companies. if this Intel story came out or Venezuela or China we would be crying a foul saying “oh look at that socialist shit, glad I live in America”

[satvikpendem]

Sure, I don't disagree on the argument, I'm just saying that people have been using the word socialism wrong for so long that it now just means when the government does something, basically.