ATTENDANCE: MARCH 27, 2020
Below is a quote from the book found on p. 176:
"A lot has been made in the last several years about income inequality and how gains made in the overall economy tend increasingly to go to the top 1%, while the rest are left with scraps. At the time of this writing, there is a lot of talk about how the American public, especially the middle and working classes, have come to believe the economic structure of America is rigged against them, and everything is tilted in favor of the insider, the moneyed, the elite. An argument can be made that this was a belief that first took hold when the dot-com bubble burst, especially to a generation of investors who came to the stock market for the first time in those years. Baby boomers did what society told them: they invested in stocks; they bought and held. And for a time, they did well, seeing their nest eggs go up by five, even six, figures (or more if they were lucky). And then they watched it all evaporate. they watched the insiders and the bankers, the lucky and the elite, walk away scot-free while they, the hardworking Americans who did what they were told, lost everything. And all of that would happen to them again less than a decade later, only this time, in the housing market."And here a recent article about insider trading (it's from The Guardian; I like to read what outsiders say about what's happening in our country). A quote from that article:
"ProPublica reports that North Carolina Republican Richard Burr, who was receiving daily coronavirus briefings as chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, “sold off a significant percentage of his stocks, unloading between $628,000 and $1.72m of his holdings,” a week before the stock market tanked. And while in public he was insisting that the government was capable of handling the virus, to well-connected constituents at the Capitol Hill Club he was warning that the virus was “much more aggressive in its transmission than anything that we have seen in recent history.” Then there was Georgia Republican Kelly Loeffler, who according to the Daily Beast also sold a substantial amount of stock in the leadup to the crash, as well as buying shares in the teleworking company Citrix. Other senators also sold stock around the same time, though the evidence of insider trading is less clear in the other cases."Thoughts?
These are freakishly similar situations, where the rich with more info and experience of this type know when to pull out of the market, and so become richer, while they don't tell anyone and so the public becomes poorer. I think this is not a good way of doing business for politicians..
ReplyDeleteI think that its unfair that people with inside information would take advantage of manipulating the stock market so that hard working Americans would once again lose money just from doing what they were told, investing in the stock markets.
ReplyDeleteThat's extremely frustrating. I really can't think of anything else to say. It's annoying and angers me. But at the same time, it doesn't surprise me. At all.
ReplyDeleteI think that before the bubble popped the stock market was supposed to be for everyone but only the 1% was privy to the knowledge of what would happen in the near future. I think this is also still true today, where only the powerful are being informed of the reality of situations.
ReplyDeleteI think it's unfair that working-class Americans who (some) work just as hard as the top 1% are losing money while the top workers flourish and leave nothing for the others.
ReplyDeleteI find your qualification with (some) interesting - was there a reason for that?
DeleteI think that some working-class Americans aren't motivated to work as hard as they could.
DeleteIt is unfair that Americans who work hard are loosing money based on the actions of the rich and upper class. The fact that they have more information should not make it reasonable for them to take advantage of the situation. It is overall not a good way to do business and keep the economy going.
ReplyDeleteI think that insider trading is a really big problem in the US and that there is definitely justification for the way that working class Americans feel about how the economy has evolved. I honestly didn't realize what big of an issue it is until I read this passage in the book.
ReplyDeletePeople with inside information will always come out on top in the stock market for the most part. Normal people can lose huge amounts of money and it has everything to do with inexperience and bad advice. Its disappointing that this happens but its never going to change.
ReplyDeleteNever going to change? I think I must be too much of an optimist then because I'm always hoping for change for the better.
DeleteI think it is unfair that it is people not in the top 1% losing money, whereas the top 1% builds on their riches. The stock market should not be manipulated to present discrepancies between classes.
ReplyDeleteI heard about the Senator last night and was annoyed to find out that someone would abuse their power like that. It seems very similar how the people in power got the upper hand while the working class struggles with a stock crash.
ReplyDeleteI think that it is unfair that even between this gap in time, history seems to be repeating itself. The rich have control, and since they are not struggling, they do not see a problem. The middle class, no matter how hard they work, can not seem to rise up.
ReplyDeletei don't understand stocks like at all, but i think that this gives a really clear view into the power that higher officials have over the stock market, and although they couldnt warn people of the crash, i think its unfair to everyday americans
ReplyDeleteI don't understand stocks either (even at my age) which kinda makes me more angry about this situation over the past 20 or so years.
DeleteI just want to put out there that I also don't understand stocks at all which has made this book kind of difficult for me to understand at times
DeleteMe too! Stocks are so confusing, it was a bunch of numbers and words that overall meant nothing to me as I was reading.
Deletealso ms. gesin if we made the questions for this discussion do we still need to answer all of them?
ReplyDeleteyes. I think they were very thoughtful questions and I'd like to know what you think.
DeleteOr you can reply to your peers' responses.
Deleteokay thank u
DeleteIt's not at all surprising but I wish there was less of it in our society. Manipulating the stock market is so dangerous, you'd have to be a person who only wanted the inside information because you only concern yourself.
ReplyDelete