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Talking about banking regulations can be quite dull. Talking about banking regulations can be quite complicated. I think it is the time we start talking more about them.
Learning about money was essential to my becoming a man. My parents taught me that when I signed an agreement about money I should realize that I was putting my reputation as a man on the line, along with my signature.
I was told about my Quaker ancestors who did not believe in signing documents or taking oaths. They believed that when they said they would do something they would do it. The idea that there were certain occasions when a man needed to swear something or sign something meant that there were times when a man’s reputation for honoring commitments wasn’t good enough. The Quakers believed that there were no such times. They believed that a “man’s word was his bond.”
Times certainly have changed.
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I remember as a boy asking my father, why our family couldn’t get a brand new car, this was in the 1950’s. Getting a new car was a big deal. Car manufacturers were sure to at least bend the sheet metal differently year after year, so that when you bought new, the neighbors knew it.
My father explained to me that he didn’t make enough money to buy a new car. He explained that he didn’t have enough money to buy a decent used car, but he was able to do so because he could get a loan from a bank. My father told me that the men at the bank would help him decide how much money he could borrow to be reasonably sure that he would be able to pay it back. I was to understand that he needed to pay the bank more than the amount that he borrowed to buy the car. This was too bad, but it was how things worked.
My father explained to me that banks needed help getting enough money to lend to people to buy cars. He then told me some great information. He made me aware that I could earn money by doing special chores around the house, which were in addition to the ones that I needed to do because I was part of a family. I was delighted to learn that any of this money that I gave to the bank would make me more money without me needing to do any chores for the bank. I could earn money by doing nothing. When I made the decision to put money in the bank instead of buying a toy that I wanted, I would be helping adults be able to have cars, and I would be able to buy a better toy in the future with the bank paying me for doing nothing.
I got a little green book from the bank. Every time I made a visit to the bank someone would write in the book about how much money I had brought in and how much interest my money had earned me, since the last time I was there. I loved that little green book.
Bankers in the small town I grew up in were very respected men. They made real money, and they had work weeks that were the shortest of anybody in town. They worked what we called “banker’s hours.”
Bankers did more than help people buy cars; they helped people understand that they couldn’t buy one yet. They taught people about the value of maintaining the car that they had, about the importance of avoiding car accidents. They gave teachings on greed and overconfidence and planning for the unexpected. They reminded adults about how they could get their money to do some of the heavy lifting of buying and sheltering things from storms.
My parents taught me about US Saving Bonds. They told me that the Federal Government had all sorts of things that it needed lots of money to buy. I could help out by purchasing stamps that I could place in a book, and when all of the spaces in the book were filled I could take it to the Post Office and get a very fancy piece of paper. This paper was the Government’s promise to give me back more money that I gave, in due time. I was proud to play a part in defending the Free World. I felt clever to know that I would be paid for the privilege. I was not taught about how much debit the US had. I didn’t need to be taught how to count up to a trillion. I was pretty old before I knew there was such a number.
When I was older, it was my Mother who taught me about the stock market. Her grand parents had been upper class. They made their money in real estate. They lost it in the Great Depression. I was shown old photographs of the family yacht, women playing golf and tennis, nice homes and new cars. They weren’t rich, rich, but they were well off.
My Mother played with the stock market by making pretend investments which made reading newspapers more fun. Not only did she enjoy the financial section, but current events took on a new interest. She explained to me how political unrest in South America could affect the selling price of United Fruit, Inc. stock. She made some small stock purchases as well.
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One day, she told me that she had gotten a suggestion from a neighbor that American Hospital Supply stock would be a fun investment. Now, the neighbor didn’t have “inside” trader information, just a chain of logic. My mother explained that companies make money by selling things but often needed money to be able to make the things they were going to sell. If I helped a company to do this, the company would give me some money every three months for helping them out. But wait there was more. I would get a fancy piece of paper to prove that I had a deal with the company. Now get this. I could sell that deal to somebody else for more money than I paid to get it. How much more? That kept changing and sometimes the deal would be worth less than I paid for it. I could read all about it in the financial section of the newspaper. How exciting.
So, while my friends were memorizing baseball player batting averages, I was doing that and lusting after profit to be made on selling my single share of American Hospital Supply stock and thrilling to the big bucks I could be making from my fantasy purchases of multiple shares of what were then known as Blue Chip stocks.
The neighbor thought that rapid advances in medical research were leading to new products that hospitalist wanted to be supplied.
I was helping sick people in hospitals by making it possible to have supplies that they needed. When I got the letter explaining that my stock had split, and I would now be getting dividends at three times the rate I had signed up for, I knew that Wall Street was populated with saints.
I grew to admire men who were the captains of industry. They made sure that cars got built and those helping the sick got what they needed to do so. They helped create jobs and build new factories and send me dividend checks. Capitalism was a populist, glorious, “-ism.”
My parents didn’t teach me how to be secretive about personal money matters. They instructed by example. They would talk about savings, but never about how much they had in the bank. They would preach on the value of living within my means, but not a word about the size of their means. My parents made their money as wage slaves in the Education field. They never discussed their salaries.
If I had stuck with my financial education, I might not be sitting here worried about how little I have in my 401K and thinking about how quickly my retirement funds are going to run out.
I went into Social Work, not banking and the pay was not so good.
The good news was that I didn’t need money in the bank to buy things because I could get easy credit. I didn’t even need to go to the bank to get the money. My little green book was a childhood toy; my first credit card made me a man.
I was not a reckless spender. I always took pause to consider if I had adequate lines of credit to cover purchases. It worked, until one day it didn’t. I did the math and determined that prospects for my financial future were not going to cover purchases made in my financial past.
I learned on my own, about not for profit companies that would negotiate with the companies that I had given my word that I would pay back, under the terms agreed upon, to fix it so I could pay less.
As I was about to sign the debt relief paperwork, I hesitated. What kind of man had I become? When I had signed for those credit cards, I was confirming that I was responsible for making good on the terms. Now I was about to sign something else that confirmed that my word as a man was not to be trusted. I gave pause and then signed the papers.
I then started looking for an additional job. I made good on the new agreements. I lost leisure time and sleep, but I made good. I was able to make good because I was lucky enough not to have medical bills that I couldn’t pay or other storms not adequately covered by insurance. I know that unless I start buying lottery tickets again, there is little hope that I can breathe easy about my financial future.
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I’ve never stiffed anyone financially in a premeditated way. I have never defaulted on anything. This could be due to my ignorance as how to make money in the new economy. I think that it is more then that.
I am a white male, and I am angry. I am college educated and don’t live in a swing state, so probably nobody cares that I am angry, but I am still angry. I want America to be good again. (I would want it to be great again, but that slogan has been taken).
America has become the World’s leading marketer of money. The USA has pioneered how to make money out of going bankrupt, how to make money by encouraging others to spend to the point of bankruptcy, how to make money by purposely investing in companies that are doing badly and are doing bad things.
It is simply old news that the two leading candidates for POTUS are heavily involved with making money in America in not such good ways. It is old news that most media focus on the titillating in politics. Banking reform coverage doesn’t sell much advertising. However, bank reform might be a common ground on which folks from opposing political groups can agree that more needs to be done.
Can we go back to not rewarding those who profit from giving others really bad financial advice? Can we move away from rewarding those who purposely invest in companies that have poor prospects? Can we respond to the myriad attempts by those who profit from financial failure to cloud and distract our attention from such practices?
Men have long been secretive about how much money they make and how. Corporate law extends the same privilege of secrecy to corporations. What if America became good at exposing how people and corporations make their money. If America were good at this many men will be ashamed. Men who make little money doing good, will not be shamed as much as men who make lots of money doing bad.
There is a strong tradition in America of a work ethic popularized by the guy on the popular hundred dollar federal reserve note, Ben Franklin, in his saying, “(a) penny saved is a penny earned.” There is an ethic of “no, free lunch,” “an honest day’s pay for an honest day’s work.” There is a work ethic of lending money at fair rates and in giving fair transparent returns to investors. There is a tradition of rewarding those that work hard and do good work. There is a tradition of taking care of those who can’t work and their families. (Okay, may be not a stellar tradition, but a tradition – think decent wages leading to decent contributions to churches and other not – for – profit organizations).
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I think most white males in America, college educated or not, believe that the core of American pride is the belief that being white and male should give no advantage over anyone else in having freedom to practice good work ethics.
Who can feel good about a day coming when there is equal access for all to play at the various games now paid to profit by ripping people off.
Maybe its time to get politically more radical. Maybe its time to dig deeper towards the roots of, if not all evil, then the roots of a good deal of it. We can dig below from a common ground above. We can be incremental in our actions, not because we lack resolve, but because deeply rooted powers will not yield to brute force. We don’t need to focus on pulling roots, but rather transplanting them. The rich and dirty need our guidance as what to grow and where to plant it.
The two leading candidates for POTUS offer great insights as to how wealth is accumulated in America by how they have made money. We can argue over who it would be easier to transplant, but let’s agree that we should not cease from asking Presidents and all other powerful people, how they make their money and off of whom.
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Photo: Getty Images
At this blog, https://collegepapers.co.uk/ collected more articles on the thematic close to this topic.