4 ms·

I kinda wish they let those banks fail. Those banks turned around and raised fees for everyone. Don't loan to most small business. Don't loan to most self-em

I kinda wish they let those banks fail. Those banks turned around and raised fees for everyone. Don't loan to most small business. Don't loan to most self-employed. Are just horrid institutions. They have just seemingly given the wealthy credit? They have given the wealthy so much money; somedays these 1 percenter's appear to be just gambling? Literally just gambling, except in the realestate market. That market is still a sure thing for them, and very rich investor knows it. And they know so many of us will never qualify for loans; so jack up that rent Thurstan! This recovery hasen't helped guys like me, or my mother who relied of safe cd rates to get ahead. (And no--I'm not blaming banks on low fed interest rates. I probally shouldn't have even wrote that last sentance.) I probally should comment--I'm no expert. I just wonder if we severely regulated credit default swaps, and the derivitave markets--the crash in 2008 would have been less dramatic? The one thing I liked about Bush is he wanted the poor/middle class in homes. He believe little guys should be given a chance. I just wish he went about it with more regulations, on the big boys. My brother in-law used to flip houses. He now is a yoga instructor. The banks won't talk to him. Houses are still being flipped, but only by the wealthy. They are making a killing in my county. They are buying up everything. Why not, at these interest rates, and banks that are literally bending over.

eli_gottlieb 10y ago
>Those banks turned around and raised fees for everyone. Don't loan to most small business. Don't loan to most self-employed. Are just horrid institutions. > >They have just seemingly given the wealthy credit? Let me relate a short story about my experiences with my regional retail bank. Since I don't have my paperwork in order with Vanguard after changing my address, I haven't been able to put my saving money into ETFs and bonds and such like I should. So it's been piling up for more than a year (yeah, irresponsible of me, I know!) in my retail bank accounts, checking and savings. When it piled up to more than $25k, the bank "invited" me to join their "Platinum" accounts. These would impose a whole bunch of minimums on how much I have to keep in my accounts (minimum $10k in checking, minimum $15k in savings, something like that), in exchange for which they would... waive a few fees. And raise my interest rate on savings to the highest heights of 1% annually! Whereas for the normal account, you get 0.02% interest annually, and for a credit card, you can get 1.5% cash back on your spending. They'll pay you more to spend than to save! To the banks, us tech workers with our measly six-figure annual incomes are just more plebs, not even worth an interest rate above inflation.
bernawil 10y ago
I wonder if what good we see in capitalism is just the period of it when there's plenty of low hanging fruit for everbody. What I mean is, we could praise a system where any guy can buy a cheap house, renovate it and call it his own. Now, take it to its logical conclusion and you'll soon have agents with access to credit leveraging all the capital to acquire every single flipable house out there and extracting maximum rent out of the people who would have got them renovated themselves in less "efficient" times.

eli_gottlieb 10y ago

>Those banks turned around and raised fees for everyone. Don't loan to most small business. Don't loan to most self-employed. Are just horrid institutions. > >They have just seemingly given the wealthy credit? Let me relate a short story about my experiences with my regional retail bank. Since I don't have my paperwork in order with Vanguard after changing my address, I haven't been able to put my saving money into ETFs and bonds and such like I should. So it's been piling up for more than a year (yeah, irresponsible of me, I know!) in my retail bank accounts, checking and savings. When it piled up to more than $25k, the bank "invited" me to join their "Platinum" accounts. These would impose a whole bunch of minimums on how much I have to keep in my accounts (minimum $10k in checking, minimum $15k in savings, something like that), in exchange for which they would... waive a few fees. And raise my interest rate on savings to the highest heights of 1% annually! Whereas for the normal account, you get 0.02% interest annually, and for a credit card, you can get 1.5% cash back on your spending. They'll pay you more to spend than to save! To the banks, us tech workers with our measly six-figure annual incomes are just more plebs, not even worth an interest rate above inflation.

bernawil 10y ago

I wonder if what good we see in capitalism is just the period of it when there's plenty of low hanging fruit for everbody. What I mean is, we could praise a system where any guy can buy a cheap house, renovate it and call it his own. Now, take it to its logical conclusion and you'll soon have agents with access to credit leveraging all the capital to acquire every single flipable house out there and extracting maximum rent out of the people who would have got them renovated themselves in less "efficient" times.