Saw this parody this morning of the Dodge farmer Super Bowl ad. Wasn't sure whether to laugh or cry.
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/so-god ... 2013-02-06
So God made a banker
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jacob
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And on the 9th day, God saw that his creation was boring and said "I need people who will take a superficial view of a complex situation and put the blame for any problems exclusively on whatever part of it they don't like."
And so God made social media and put all those people there.
God said, "I need people who are unable to consider an issue from more than one side, ever. People who will form an opinion and then proceed to find facts to "support" it. People who think functions and behaviors they don't understand are useless despite taking them for granted and being ignorant of doing so. People who think discussions are about winning, like sports, yay!"
And so God made the Reply button.
God said, "I need people who don't like and who don't understand finance to blame the credit crisis on deregulation. I need people who don't like and who don't understand how it is to be poor to blame the credit crisis on subprime borrowers. I need people who have never experienced a conflict of interest to blame it on subprime lenders. I need people who don't like the government to blame the credit crisis on bailouts. I need people who think of themselves as investors and don't understand the purpose of trading and yet take its service for granted to blame traders for the crash. Oh.. and I'll put all these people on the same [web] page. It'll be fun."
And God saw that there were lies, damned lies, and statistics.
That most humans had an uncompromising urge to assign a cause to every effect as if every observation must have a single cause. He saw that whenever those humans saw a bad effect they put all the blame on whatever they didn't like or understand. Conversely, they took credit for themselves or their affiliates for all the good outcomes. That people prefer simple narratives that reinforce the us vs them tribal behavior, which is good in bad times, but bad in good times.
And these were good times...but that seeing all these discussions made him feel pretty bad.
And so God made social media and put all those people there.
God said, "I need people who are unable to consider an issue from more than one side, ever. People who will form an opinion and then proceed to find facts to "support" it. People who think functions and behaviors they don't understand are useless despite taking them for granted and being ignorant of doing so. People who think discussions are about winning, like sports, yay!"
And so God made the Reply button.
God said, "I need people who don't like and who don't understand finance to blame the credit crisis on deregulation. I need people who don't like and who don't understand how it is to be poor to blame the credit crisis on subprime borrowers. I need people who have never experienced a conflict of interest to blame it on subprime lenders. I need people who don't like the government to blame the credit crisis on bailouts. I need people who think of themselves as investors and don't understand the purpose of trading and yet take its service for granted to blame traders for the crash. Oh.. and I'll put all these people on the same [web] page. It'll be fun."
And God saw that there were lies, damned lies, and statistics.
That most humans had an uncompromising urge to assign a cause to every effect as if every observation must have a single cause. He saw that whenever those humans saw a bad effect they put all the blame on whatever they didn't like or understand. Conversely, they took credit for themselves or their affiliates for all the good outcomes. That people prefer simple narratives that reinforce the us vs them tribal behavior, which is good in bad times, but bad in good times.
And these were good times...but that seeing all these discussions made him feel pretty bad.
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secretwealth
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Yeah, I'm with Jacob.
A lot of bankers are the scum of the earth, but the worst people categorically I have ever met are English professors, especially the Champagne socialists like Noam Chomsky who charge universities in developing countries thousands of dollars to hear him speak. Still, I wouldn't go around saying how every single English professor is the scum of the Earth.
The world's pretty damn complicated, and bankers are a pretty diverse bunch, but that doesn't keep people from transposing their own frustrations with their own lives onto a group, or blaming all of them for what a subset (even if it is a big subset) did in the past.
A lot of bankers are the scum of the earth, but the worst people categorically I have ever met are English professors, especially the Champagne socialists like Noam Chomsky who charge universities in developing countries thousands of dollars to hear him speak. Still, I wouldn't go around saying how every single English professor is the scum of the Earth.
The world's pretty damn complicated, and bankers are a pretty diverse bunch, but that doesn't keep people from transposing their own frustrations with their own lives onto a group, or blaming all of them for what a subset (even if it is a big subset) did in the past.
A former commercial bank officer here (20+ years). With the caveat of not watching the above link I must say that many, if not most, of the negative stereotypes about bankers are very true. Every waking work minute is dedicated to squeezing as much revenue as possible from bank clients. Every minute.
Think about it.
djc
Think about it.
djc
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secretwealth
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