May 26, 2011
I’m writing because my family and I were affected by the economic collapse of 2008, and we don’t want it to happen again.
Wall Street greed and outrageous pay practices were a major cause of the collapse. One way to change the incentives so they don’t collapse our economy again would be for regulators to use a *safety index* for incentive compensation, instead of a profit index.
Currently, most bankers receive stock options. So if they can generate more profits, the stock price goes up, and their options become more valuable.
Instead, what if they used the bank’s bond price, which measures the overall ability of the bank to repay its own debt? Another measure of bank stability is the spread on credit default swaps (the insurance-like policies that are essentially bets, where one gambler bets with another that a particular firm will fail). The closer a bank comes to failing (such as in failing to pay of its bond debt), the bigger the spread on credit default swaps.
We also need to end the outrageous speculation game on oil prices; evidence has already shown that speculators in the market have found ways to artificially boost prices of crude so that they can profit on futures contracts they've bought short; TAKE AWAY the short-buying abilities, make the speculators pay full price for the futures trades they execute. I'm tired of being hosed at the pump because of the blatant manipulation by these swindlers. Let supply-and-demand pricing resume, so we no longer see record oil prices when there's a glut of crude on the market.
Thank you for considering my comment,
Darren Young
Los Angeles, CA