New York’s mayor-elect

Don’t screw it up


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serban p.

It is hard to get the rich to cough more money in taxes if they can escape them by moving elsewhere. Their taxes must go up nationally, not just locally. It is hard for them to keep making money by moving to Mexico (Europe is out since taxes are higher there). On the other hand moving from New York to New Jersey or Connecticut is no big deal. The question is how much of a premium are the rich willing to pay for enjoying life in Manhattan, my guess is that it is more than they are paying now.
Bloomberg was an effective mayor, in great part because he was hard nosed but not a constipated conservative. DeBlasio's agenda is too ambitious and he will not be able to deliver, on the other hand it remains to be seen if he will have any effect (positive or negative) on the quality of life in NYC.

This is the typical union mentality that you can keep sucking on money sources up to the level *just below* the point at which it is calculated that it will flee this abuse. And then the objective becomes to make every place equally as obnoxious so that you can raise this maximal level of expropriation even higher. This is cloaked in the ‘ethics’ of equality of outcome, but this ‘ethics’ has nothing to do with the equality of opportunity or with justice or with freedom which are the roots of American democracy. Rather, it is all about what you can get away with, that is, how much power you have. It is the ethics of tyrants.

The tyrants were the aristocrats who forgot noblesse oblige and shamelessly exploited the peasantry. These days the world (and the US in particular) is becoming a plutocracy and the same general trend of forgetting that with wealth comes social responsibility is prevalent. Some try to do good with their wealth but too many think they deserve a dozen McMansions, a huge yacht, a personal jet,
have no obligation to those who make their wealth possible and that the little people are the ones who should be paying taxes. The fact that the minimum wage today is half of what it was in the 70's (after accounting for inflation) says it all.

First, you need to be very careful when you assess who makes wealth possible. For while it is true that *labor* is the source of all wealth, it is also true that the means of production *amplifies* the wealth-producing ability of labor. So, especially with unskilled labor in a modern factory, it is the means of production that is the primary source of the added value of the end product. A man may press a button and whether he makes a nail, a pair of shoes or an entire automobile is independent of his input, whereas it is very much dependent upon the machinery that that button is connected to. And the value of whatever is produced is also related to the marketing, the R&D, the customer service, etc etc, of the corporation.

Skilled labor is different, for in that case it is exactly the quality of the individual’s input that determines the result. This is generally amplified by the means of production as well, that is, the computers, the association of team members, the marketing department, etc., but the individual skilled laborer affects the outcome of the product in a significant way that the unskilled laborer doesn’t.

That being said, the degree of social responsibility that one has for individuals does not vary with their wealth-producing ability, and one’s social obligations should be in relation to the degree that one benefits (monetarily or otherwise) from the social order. So yes, the wealthy have a social responsibility to their fellows, but it is not an open-ended responsibility, and it is not related to the degree that money can be extorted from them. Further, how the wealthy choose to spend their wealth is not a factor in determining their social responsibility for that obligation is grounded in moral and social principles independently of individuals. People do not *deserve* a dozen mansions but neither are they morally lax if they choose to spend their wealth in that manner.

The amount of wealth individuals accumulate in their lifetime (whether through work or inheritance) is only weakly correlated to how much wealth they produce for the society at large and even less to their worth to society. How wealthy was van Gogh? How much was Einstein worth? Does Mitt Romney really deserve to have hundreds of millions dollars stashed away in offshore accounts? I can imagine better uses for that money. For every Bill Gates and Steve Jobs there are a dozen Mitt Romneys.
Should the CEO of a failing company still earn 20 times more than the president of the USA? I claim no one is entitled, no matter what he does, to have control over immense wealth. That is an artificial social construction and not the sign of a healthy society.

When do you assess a man’s social worth? *Who* assesses a man’s social worth? Van Gogh, and innovative artists in general, are notoriously ignored during their lifetimes because they are assaulting the ‘truths’ of their social order, be they artistic or political conventions, and those who have a stake in that social order will not willingly be displaced. A key benefit of an open society is that the established order is *not* in control of assessing a law-abiding man’s social worth and *not* in control of the benefits that any individual might legally accrue. That is, an open society allows truths to be found and evolved as an ongoing activity, whereas in a doctrinaire world in which everyone has their designated social value and their designated social place, established truths are never displaced without some sort of revolution and its associated beheadings.

Yes, we have all sorts of millionaire louts who got their wealth through happenstance or little substantive activity of their own, but in the broader scheme of things their presence is a mark of a healthy society *exactly* because they *are* worthless. Nobody would accord these fools value, yet here they are. Meaning that nobody in society has the right to stamp a value on their head and nobody has a right to take from them what they own simply because their wealth is in excess of their designated social value.

Social freedom is indeed an ‘artificial social construction’ that was somehow institutionalized in 1787, and one that has been assaulted ever since. It offends *everyone* because there is no legal way to keep your enemies from getting ahead; no way to force people to circumscribe their behavior so as to not offend one’s own refined sensibilities. To restrict government is to restrict its coercive power, and by all appearances, the coercive power of an absolute government is man’s greatest aspiration. But God save you if it is your enemy who gets it!

At least a union member contributes to their local economy since they don't earn enough to create fantastic off-shore investment schemes.
If you make the rich even richer (as the US gov't has been so good at with all its bailouts and wars) all you're doing is sending your own local wealth overseas. It's the only rational thing to do--any financial adviser worth their keep would tell you to DIVERSIFY and the rich have the ability to do that (thus ruining your own local economy by siphoning off money and sending it overseas).
Of course, this is a narrative that the Americans have missed, and, that's why current middle class Americans are worse off than their parents a generation ago while the upper class are doing better than they were a generation ago.

I am sorry but the logic of this escapes me.

The rich too must live someplace, indeed, many have multiple residences, and each one of those residences is most likely more opulent than the home of your average union member. That means that to furnish and maintain those residences the rich will be contributing more to their local economy than do those union members. Further, the lifestyle of the rich is more expensive, since they have a greater number and more expensive clothing, cars, appliances, works of art, jewelry, etc, etc, most of which are bought in the local economy and so contribute beyond that of your union member. More frequent and more opulent parties, more visits to restaurants, theatres and shows, and in general the rich channel a greater amount of money into the local economy to maintain a more lavish lifestyle than do your average union worker.

In terms of investments, you are correct that the rich will invest in offshore ventures, stocks, real-estate, etc, but they *also* will invest in America, and indeed they will likely do so significantly more than does the average union worker. And this investment will not just be in stocks and bonds but actually owning and running a business, which not only contributes to the local economy, but most likely *employs* union members. And employment will be in America because most rich are not the CEO’s of multinational corporations but own small and middle-sized companies.

However you look at it then, the rich contribute more to their local economies than do the average Joe.

In regards to your comment that the American middle class is worse off than their parents, I don’t have any numbers on that, but if they are, then they simply have not been paying attention for is *trivial* for anyone of even a modest income to become wealthy if they have a modicum of financial discipline.

Here’s the secret: invest $3000 a year in an S&P index fund. The 25 year annualized return of the S&P 500 is in excess of 10%. That means that if you follow this strategy for 35 years you will have in excess of $800,000 in the bank. So even if you didn’t invest until you were 30, you could still retire with some $80,000 yearly income on top of whatever pension you might have, *and* pass on $800,000 to your children. This is not super rich but it *is* financially independent, which is pretty much the definition of ‘rich.’ Note too, that if they had two children then they will *start off* with maybe $250,000 each. Meaning that they will have over a million in around 15 years. If the middle class is losing financially then they had better go back and redo high school for the math here is pretty simple.

And how about the average unionized Joe? He pays the government what? $2000 a year into a government pension plan and his company pays at least another $1000 a year for mandatory ‘benefits’? If the unionized guy got that $3000 that the government steals from him for his ‘benefits’ he could retire a rich man too. But currently the government ends up with the $800,000 in cash and the unionized guy gets maybe a $50,000 pension from the $80,000 yearly income generated by that $800,000, and he dies with nothing. If you want a reason for the broadening wealth differential between rich and poor, *that* is a good candidate. That is, your friendly welfare-oriented government is keeping the average guy poor by stealing his capital and paying him only the interest off of it as a pension. When they guy dies, the government pockets the cash and rumbles on about the broadening wealth-gap and how the rich must pay more tax.

DG Reid in reply to serban p.

Today, people grow up, drop out of high school or spend six years in college on borrowed money studying 'current events', and when their financial ship doesn't come in, complain about income inequality. Raise the minimum wage? The 'minimum wage' has never helped anyone in the long term except US competitors. If people aren't being paid for productivity, they are being subsidized by people who are productive.

serban p. in reply to DG Reid

Tell those earning a minimum wage that raising it does not help anyone. The fact is that Germany has higher minimum wages than the US and it is doing just fine. It is a myth propagated by those who only think about profits that the minimum wage is bad of the economy. On the contrary, raising lower salaries would increase domestic demand and help domestic economy.

DG Reid in reply to serban p.

In 1964, In a speech, Ronald Reagan said, "... it isn't so much that liberals don't know anything, it is that so much of what they know is wrong."

The minimum wage is a subsidy. It is not that the people being subsidized don't benefit; it is that everyone else is paying for it. This is better how?

The New Yorker

I truly wish de Blasio good fortune, as well as New York City at large.

Nevertheless, de Blasio's victory is symptomatic of our current society's thirst for political 'feeling' versus pragmatic 'thinking.' Many people prefer to believe feel-good theories over time-tested facts.

Seemingly, today's culture eschews President John F. Kennedy's key inaugural message: "Ask not what your country can do for you—ask what you can do for your country."


Don't worry about the 1% paying 43%. They have got 98% of the wealth. They should pay more. There is something so rotten in the current system, where bankers can cause mayhem through their greed, and yet be the first to recover and get richer

DylanAtStrubmle... Your post got me to thinking.

One of the problems on envying the wealth of the elites is that it detracts from the conversation society should be having and plays right into the hands of the elites (usually): how do you create a sustainable and as-equitable-as-possible tax system?

There's very little evidence that high tax rates send the wealthy elsewhere, UNLESS loopholes exist in tax codes that allow money earned in one jurisdiction to be taxed elsewhere. And, there's also no evidence that Reaganomics works (trickle down effect of wealth--once the wealthy get even richer so will the rest).

So, high taxes on the rich aren't going to (a) prevent any non-existent trickle-down effect, or (b) send them and their wealth running for the hills.

This makes it fairly realistic to tax the rich at high rates.

But, the biggest issue is sustainability of the tax base. If you rely too much on the wealthy, an economic crisis can hit the public finances very suddenly and cause great problems--look at what happened in California a few years ago. Proportionately their tax system relied too heavily on the wealthiest in society and the State gov't ended up in trouble.

So, while taxing the rich is not at all a problem (except for the ideologues who recognise that the rich siphon off wealth from society at large but firmly believe in a dog-eat-dog anti-social society), it can lead governments down paths that can leave their financial footing insecure.

If tax rates on the middle class are too low (relative to the rich) then that leaves government susceptible to economic swings which can feed into the hand of the destroy government at all costs neoconservative movement seen at its most extreme in the Tea Party.

And, if tax rates on the rich are too low relative to the middle class then you--as a society--are basically allowing societal wealth to be skimmed off and removed from circulation, thus dampening your economic growth.

Of course, we live in an era where corporations and the wealthy have turned manipulating public opinion into a science and have created false narratives that are bought up hook, line and sinker by a pliable public.

I have only to look at my own home town, Toronto to the see how the "truth" diverges from the facts.

There's a populist narrative in Toronto that the city government is bloated, inefficient and that rate payers are badly over-taxed--and, resulted in the election of a mayor who, incidentally is a crack head and quite possibly an accomplish to some pretty serious criminal behaviour.

Paradoxically every independent look at the city comes to the opposite conclusion.

Look at the books and you see it runs efficiently--and, the "tough on waste" mayor has found very little in the way to cut (most of his claims of savings are cloak-and-dagger accounting).

The transit system--often pointed to as an example of wanton waste--runs with the LOWEST public subsidy (<20%) of any transit system in Canada (where the norm is 40%-50%) AND THE UNITED STATES (who, are even worse than Canada at funding public transit) yet it also has reasonable fares without zones (3 CAD~3 USD).

This same kind of narrative that is incongruous with reality is cropping up more and more in the developed world and points to the skill of the rich at manipulating public impressions of government.

Ah well, in democracies you get the government you deserve, and, if people are prepared to let themselves get harmed by electing politicians who paint inaccurate pictures, then they have only themselves to blame.

DG Reid in reply to OntarioPundit

There are no unbiased reports on cities or much else. The only way to get to what is real - like it or not - give people freedom to choose, and let them live with the consequences. If you want to obliterate the rich with taxes, fine, you can, but you can't make them return once they leave. If you want to subsidize people, go ahead, but good luck getting them to work without subsidies. The bedrock of liberalism is that there will always be someone to pay for the government's pet programs. Escape routes must be closed! What's the difference between this and slavery?

serban p. in reply to DG Reid

The rock bed of liberalism is that a country is a community where people have rights and with those rights come responsibilities for others in the community. It is rock bed of liberalism that a mark of a civilized country is one with a government whose main function is to ensure that the vast majority can lead a good life, afford a good education regardless of income, have decent health care without being forced into bankruptcy and one in which wealth does not buy political influence. The US is not a liberal country and that is not something to be proud of. Freedom of want is more important than freedom to exploit others and avoid paying taxes. The most pernicious conservative myth is that the poor are responsible for their plight and the rich deserve all the wealth they have regardless of how they acquired it. The other pernicious myth is that the government cannot do anything right so should not be used to try to improve society. In fact much of what made the US the power it is today was by government investment and providing the infrastructure that allowed private enterprises to flourish. Any serious study of American history proves it, for some peculiar reason the right wingers in this country do not know US history, only self serving myths.

serban p. in reply to DG Reid


DG Reid in reply to serban p.

First of all Susan, the bedrock (not rock bed) of this country is freedom, and has nothing to do with an obligation to take care of others. Taking care of others who are trying to take care of themselves is a Christian ethic, and to be encouraged, but not to the point of the government taking money from those who earn it, and giving it to those who don't. The problem with people in general is that once you start giving them something, they immediately come to expect it. There is no end. They become society's dependents, and vote consistently to keep the largesse coming their way. Democrats live by this.

If there were limits on government aid, and it had to be repaid at some point, such a system might work, but there are no such requirements. Recipients quickly learn that once you qualify for enough government programs, you can survive without further effort and lose the motivation to become self-sufficient. This is borne out by the experience of countries across the world going back 200 years. It just doesn't work.

"Laissez faire" Capitalism is a far from perfect system, but it is based on preserving individual freedom while liberal philosophy is based on taking freedom away. Liberal systems inevitably give way to tyranny when people get tired of supporting people who won't support themselves and revolt. The governments, to preserve their own power, must suppress any effort to change the system – all in the name of the 'greater good'. Liberalism is a road to national poverty where nobody is allowed to rise above the rest, and eventually, nobody tries.

CajunGypsy in reply to DG Reid

I'm a liberal, and if you claim the right to try and tell me what I believe, or what my political philosophy is really about, then you'd better be prepared to take what you dish out.
You claim liberalism is "based on taking freedom away." Have you even looked up the definition of the word "liberal"? Liberals - at least myself and those I know - are a lot more about freedom than many conservatives. We want everyone to have freedom to breathe clean air and drink clean water; to marry the person they love, no matter their race, creed or gender; to move up the economic ladder as far and as fast as their efforts will take them (and to earn as much as any other like-qualified person for the same work), regardless of gender or other factors; to live free of abuse and violence; to choose whether they will bring children into the world, before and during pregnancy; to express themselves as the First Amendment guarantees, within the reasonable limits any society expects (no shouting "fire" in a crowded theater, or attacking someone for their race/sexuality/you-name-it), and more.
From all I have seen, the only ones a lot of conservatives want to have freedom are, in no particular order, themselves; big polluting, worker-abusing, consumer-defrauding companies, including health insurers; racist and homophobic bullies; sexist, misogynist jerks; rapacious financial-industry firms and the people who run them; religious moralists who want to enforce their narrow-minded worldview on everyone and claim God's favor for doing so; and everyone else out to do others the sort of harm governments are instituted in part to prevent. Seems to me both sides want to use the force of law to grant freedom to some and take it from others; the only difference is to/from whom.


A mayor does not have the legislative tools and powers to take on inequality. His job is about making the city run smoothly, keep costs and crime down, make the city livable but friendly to business, and help to run the schools. Those are all difficult jobs. By trying to use the mayor's powers to tackle inequality some of those other priorities will have to suffer, and yet inequality will be affected only in token ways. That is the great flaw in DeBlasio's platform and mandate. He lacks the tools to deliver, and could do a good deal of harm trying.


The biggest problem that sticks out is that it bangs on about the impact of police reforms from a position that whoever wrote this should know full well is intellectually dishonest. Giuliani gets the credit for cutting crimes rates, but two simple facts show that this credit is largely undeserved. The first is that some of the fastest drops in crime happened under Dinkins, the second - and most important - is that crime dropped precipitously across the United States in this same period. Most cities did not adopt Giuliani-style reforms, some (Boston, for example) went consciously in the other direction and yet crime still fell there as well.
After that, the point about plutocrats is factually valid - they are a major pillar of tax revenue - but again the author commits a major logical fallacy. Yes, they are important, but the very inequality of the city is what dictates this reliance. Of course they'll be the ones paying a disproportionate amount of tax if they're the ones earning disproportionate amounts of money. Consider it in this vein, given that NYC essentially has a flat tax, the top 1% of New Yorkers earn 43% of all the taxable income in the city. How is that not ludicrous?
It's only at the end that we finish wading through the excrement and find the merely mediocre. The points about school choice and rent control are to be expected, but I expect better from the Economist in approaching it with all the finesse of the comment bubble of Page 3. De Blasio does oppose these reforms, but it's worth considering the extent to which they are unproven and have sometimes shown themselves to be detrimental to the education of students.
The rent control statement is also problematic - Bloomberg unleashed a torrent of private residential development that NYC hasn't seen since before the war, yet rents have increased at breakneck speed. People say that rent control inhibits development. That may be theoretically true, but in practice development has progressed as quickly as planning laws would allow and yet rents have rocketed.
Until the Economist and anti-rent control adovcates can square the reality of New York today, where rent control/stabilization is the only thing holding many communities together in the face of massive development, then I suggest they be quiet until they can reconsider their opinions.
I've rarely been so disappointed in something I've read in the Economist.

lightningrob in reply to petermoorenyc

Crime did drop across the US (with notable exceptions like Detroit), but not at the rate they did in NYC. And please share some data about crime dropping under Dinkins. I distinctly recall crime being at a high point before he lost reelection.

sfkauder in reply to petermoorenyc

Interesting that liberals can say that it hasn't been proven that rent control inhibits development and charter schools haven't been proven to work but are utterly convinced that humankind is the cause of global warming.


It will be educational to see how this turns out. I am rooting for New York. No party or Mayor has been able to do very much damage. New York will win.

De Blasio will change the agenda some but he is not an idiot. He will, as most mayors have, stick close to he middle. Even Bloomberg learned that he needed to constantly draw in all parties or he would be blocked.

Being the Mayor of New York is an exercise in political and social survival.


By publishing this too-right-wing-for-my-taste article, The Economist is taking a risk of losing some subscriptions - mine for example.

jrvjr in reply to WhyIask

Don't cancel. I am not completely sure the article is going to fly but it is a seemingly honest attempt to make de Blasio be careful about what he does.

I have read the Economist for decades. It has been ahead of the curve more than any other new weekly. They miss often but most of the information is very useful.

I think de Blasio will do well. He will have to climb the same hill as Michael Bloomberg climbed. That climb changes every new Mayor. Mayor of New York nearly always transcends party.

I am very curious to see how this plays out. I am big fan of NYC even though I don't live there. I have spent thousands of hours in NYC. It is a great city. It births great Mayors.

Watch this theme in the Economist. NYC will also change them as things evolve.

WhyIask in reply to jrvjr

Thanks to jrvjr. That was a very good response to my comment. I have read The Economist for a long time too. As for "ahead of the curve", I find it to be totally wrong sometimes, as when it comes down hard on left-of-centre governments in Latin America when their people are just trying to escape American corporate suppression, manipulation and overthrow. My most recent threat to cancel was when The Economist chided Obama for not bombing the hell out of Syria. But there isn't a better news magazine for quality of writing and for breadth of coverage (science, arts, book reviews, etc.), punctuated by in-depth treatment of subjects. For that I guess I can put up with them being wrong, even totally out to lunch, sometimes.


After Rudy Guiliani and Michael Bloomberg, de Blasio seems a strange and incongruous choice. He seems to be adverse to some of the measures that his predecessors implemented that have made NYC such a safe and inviting destination. It remains to be seen how he will act once in office, but if he attempts to block the highly successful efforts of Ray Kelly and other champions of public safety, I would expect to see Mr. di Blasio gently escorted off the stage by the city's business leaders.


The turnaround in NYC crime started with David Dinkins -- he's the one who hired Bratton and started putting more boots on the ground. The first year of Dinkins' term (1990) was the most violent in NYC recent history. Giuliani certainly deserves credit for making Bratton commissioner and pushing forward with reform that increased the rate of crime reduction, but don't pretend that it started with Giuliani.


Four years with a left-wing political hack is unlikely to be fatal for NYC, and it may give the opposition party time to select and groom a candidate with a decent shot at winning.

WestEndAl in reply to iThinker

Ah, true; but he's not been fatal (yet), and the opposition didn't field an electable candidate. Cold fish, whether a Lhota or a Romney, don't do well in the cauldron of NY/US politics.


Your point about supporting the Sandinistas does not make him a Marxist in a matter of opinion and only he knows for sure, however it does make him a fool.

WhyIask in reply to Charliesdad720

Nonsense. Much honor to him and perception by him for supporting the Sandinistas at the time. I wish I had been knowledgeable and wise enough to have done so. But to me a fool is someone who can look back now and fail to see what was going on. Go read Stephen Kinzer's 2007 book "Overthrow: America's Century of Regime Change from Hawaii to Iraq".


The article is so full of right wing talking points, I'd have to spend an hour just to debunk them all! What a shamelessly biased piece by an obvious Wall Street flunky.

Magyar42 in reply to Ameribugger

Would you be kind enough to educate us all by debunking the "right wing talking points" in this article. I do not work in Wall Street, I do not live in NYC. But I heard a lot of Mr. de Blasio's "left wing talking points" during his campaign stumps, ( Soak the rich !) and I also had the opportunity to hear hard left Harry Belafonte supporting the Mayor elect candidacy. So please, educate us all right wing extremists.

WhyIask in reply to Magyar42

I was born in NYC and lived there for 13 years of my life, counting the "backs" in the backs & forths. So I am not ignorant of NYC, and I care. But I care about more than how attractive NYC is to the corporations. And, like Ameribugger, I don't have time to try to educate an apparently impervious person. My suggestion would be that he read some economists not approved of by The Economist - like Krugman, Reich and Stiglitz. BTW Blasio did well across all races and income groups, not just with the poor, not just with Romney's "47 percent".

owlsroost2 in reply to WhyIask

You must be kidding! All three guys put together don't know enough about economics to run a lemonade stand without going bankrupt. Or it would take massive government subsidies funded by taxes confiscated from productive business entrepreneurs. Your constant effort to redistribute wealth proves the fact that socialism is dead without capitalism paying for it. You are trying to kill the goose that lays the golden eggs. That, dear left-wingers, is a sign of monumental stupidity!

CajunGypsy in reply to owlsroost2

I don't know from Stiglitz, but considering Dr. Krugman won the Nobel Prize for economics, Prof. Reich got hired as Secretary of Labor and both have been teaching economics for decades, they probably know one hell of a lot more about the subject than you do. And decades of liberal policy (when it's been allowed, which is actually not all that often in US history) have not yet "killed the goose," or we would be in far worse shape than we are as a nation today.
Your characterization of taxation as "confiscation from the productive for the nonproductive" and accusing liberals of wanting such proves you are the ignorant one, not Messrs. Krugman, Reich or Stiglitz, or the previous commenter.

Connect The Dots

The last Democratic Mayor was reduced to his knees by--this is too incredible to believe-- The Squeegee Men.
They were the most successful Arch Villain of Gotham.
NYC was almost in ruin.
Too much permissive liberalness allowed homeless men--mostly alcoholics, drug abusers, and excons-- to extort motorist and citizens trapped in traffic for an 'obligation' for a lousy window job.
They preyed on the people in broad daylight.
And the Mayor's Office was powerless.
'Stop-and-Frisk', stopped the Squeegee Men, but they were a devious and formidable foe.
de Blasio is inclined to stop 'Stop-and-Frisk'
de Blasio must ask: Who are The Squeegee Men of Tomorrow?


This is the most flagrantly biased article I've ever read in this magazine. I like the assertion that one-percenters like to work with "other brainy folk" as if income is the best measure of how intelligent a person is. Really shameful for a publication that is usually so even-keel.

Nerbanke in reply to Zen Novice

Would you mind explaining why?

As I see it, your assertion makes the same curious slippage from 'brainy' to 'wealthy,' two terms that are not equivalent. If 'like likes like' then the correct inference would surely be that the wealthy recruit the wealthy. That seems closer to the truth.

It's also a very different conclusion from the pseudo-meritocratic platitude that the rich are richer than everyone else because they are smarter than everyone else. So to repeat: what trash.

J. Kemp

To protect New York, America and the world, Mr. de Blasio should institute and immediate new security policy:

Stop and frisk all bankers.

"Reasonable suspicion" is the lawful basis for New York's stop and frisk policies towards minority males. Clearly there is enough evidence to which has come to light to support "reasonable suspicion" of all who work in financial services in New York.

New York's bankers have done untold damage to the world by their highly manipulative criminal behavior. It is time to stop and frisk them all so as to find out what new weapons of financial destruction they are packing and preparing to unleash against the public.

Given that virtually every senior banker in New York is a client of Mr. Bloomberg's company, paying $18,000 per year for their "Bloomberg" terminal, it is understandable that Mr. Bloomberg may have felt a bit constrained in implementing such a policy. Mr. de Blasio, has no such constraints, and therefore should commence an immediate stop-and-frisk procedure directed at financial services "professionals" (sic) in New York.

f3wkNuAXJ9 in reply to J. Kemp

Hmmm...stop and frisk already exists for New York bankers. The SEC is in residence, in force, at every major New York financial institution. The government has extorted billions from JP Morgan for the sin of buying Washington Mutual and Bears Stearns, which was done at the behest of the government without chance for due diligence. The amount of regulatory oversight, much of which is counter-productive and misguided, is staggering.

Magyar42 in reply to J. Kemp

This measure if implemented, will do wonders for the City's economy! Yes, go ahead and run these bastards out of the city, after all, they only pay....43% of the city taxes. The evil bankers!

Frederick24 in reply to J. Kemp

Don't forget history here - while there were many bad actors it started with failed housing policies in the Clinton administration and by the government relaxing underwriting standards. Go ahead and blame the bankers but you should have said stop and frisk all of the progressives in DC - throw them out! Is it 2017 yet?

J. Kemp in reply to Magyar42

Oh, so global financial crime, and the devastation on the world this last time around, is perfectly fine with you Magyar42 as long as the criminals suppor 43% of the cost of running New York city? Are you thinking about what they did to the people who don't live in New York, and how they looted the futures of many cities and many millions of people around the world?

But you don't mind as long as these criminals support the public good structure of a gleaming Manhattan.

Your apparent lack of concern for your fellow human beings seems to suggest that you are perfectly qualified to be a Banker in New York.

J. Kemp in reply to Frederick24

Silicon Valley Ed,

I fully support throwing most members of America's congress in the stockade. They were absolutely complicit with their corrupt partners in the financial services sector. Two devils making a deal which sent the world to hell.

J. Kemp in reply to f3wkNuAXJ9

"The amount of regulatory oversight, much of which is counter-productive and misguided, is staggering."

Surely you are correct. In China, if I'm not mistaken, some of the types of financial wrongdoing which seem to have occurred in New York are punished with the death penalty. Perhaps you think that would be more efficient and fair? Certainly it would provide a stronger deterrent than non-bankrupting fines and letting the wrongdoers go about their merry way.

But you complain about the inconvenience of regulatory oversight. More likely the problem will be the ineffectiveness of regulatory oversight as the most innovative financial criminal class in the world comes up with new ways to loot civilization and destroy the global economy.

Magyar42 in reply to J. Kemp

Can you please explain this "global financial crime and devastation" , created by Wall Street in more detail. I am particularly eager in being educated on how" they looted the futures of many cities" . How about the $17 TRillion debt of the US government, was that created by the bankers? How about the fact that Detroit went bankrupt and so are half the major cities in California. That is my real concern, the fact this country and its cities is being bankrupted by corrupt politicians that are only interested in their reelection by selling their souls to the unions.

J. Kemp in reply to Magyar42

Wall Street firms heavily promoted sub-prime mortgage backed "securities" which they knew full well were driven by rampant housing price speculation and held by individuals who could not pay the mortgages for their duration.

Cities depend upon tax payments by citizens, which are often real estate taxes. Wall Street, through sub-prime lending, and packaging of securities backed by these risky mortgages, created a big bubble and pocketed enormous bonus monies during the run up, knowing full well that when people began to default on shoddy mortgates, this would destroy the personal economics of so many millions of people as well as the tax bases of many American cities. This resulted in many job losses, destroyed families and destroyed lives.

Wall Street bankers don't seem to be bothered by what they did to so many people. They seem to feel they are entitled to engage in the economic exploitation and slaughter of innocent Americans who have been manipulated by bank marketing among other profiteering forces which were at work.



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