I'm with you about the equity available within the 'system', Hans. i seriously don't know what people are expecting a $700 billion 'bail out' is actually going to do. The institutions have money, but they don't lend to each other at the moment as it's seen as a risk. Is giving these places billions of dollars not a fucking risk? Are we expecting that this money covers all the bad debt from the whole sub-prime thing so they can lend again without worry? You may as well give that money to every person who has a mortgage with these institutions instead, so they can pay of the debts they're actually struggling to keep up with? Should even free up a fair wad of money to dispose of in the economy and save all the struggling shops instead
I'm also very uneasy at throwing money at companies who still have the same boards in control. Surely they should all be sacked as a minimum requirement for financial aid? No 'early retirement', no 'standing down for personal reasons', no 'golden parachute pay-off' - straight dismissal. If we're going to play government involvement now, then there's a major flaw in the current free-market model (hardly news). There has to be criminal investigations into every one of the institutions now asking for help. Also, it's basic market sense to sack board members that are pulling in between 200-400 times their average employee salary when they've steered the company into essentially going bust. Where's the value in keeping them?
If these companies are so big, and control so much of the nation's wealth that we can't afford to let them go out of business, then they're surely too big to be in business. Break 'em up. Asset strip them, as they do to the places
they buy up.
I can't get past the notion that if these places get public money injected then they should give up a sizeable chunk of ownership based on the percentage of capital that's input compared to total market value (should be pretty good amounts at the moment while shares are down). The taxpayer should get to share in the future dividends and general money making.