A Whining Wall Street Banker Pleads for Pity
Jamie is PO’d. He’s fed up with all of this populistic attitude that’s sweeping the country, and he’s not going to take it anymore!
Jamie Dimon recently bleated to reporters that, “Banks are under assault.” Well, not most banks, but JPMorgan Chase, America’s largest Wall Street empire, which Jamie heads. Government regulators, snarls Jamie, are pandering to grassroots populist anger at Wall Street excesses by squeezing the life of JP Morgan casino.
But wait – didn’t JPMorgan score a $22 billion profit last year, a 20 percent increase over 2013 and the highest in its history? And didn’t those Big Bad Oppressive Government Regulators provide a $25 billion taxpayer bailout in 2008 to save Jamie’s conglomerate from its own reckless excess? And isn’t this Wall Street popinjay raking in some $20 million in personal pay to suffer the indignity of this so- called “assault” on his bank. Yes, yes, and yes.
Still, Jamie says that regulators are piling on JPMorgan Chase: “In the old days,” he whined, "you dealt with one regulator when you had an issue. Now it's five or six. You should all ask the question about how American that is," the $20-million-a-year man lectured to reporters, "how fair that is."
Well, golly, one reason Chase has half-a-dozen regulators on its case is because it doesn't have "an issue" of illegality, but beaucoup illegalities, including deceiving its own investors, cheating more than two million of its credit card customers, gaming the rules to overcharge electricity users in California and the Midwest, overcharging active-duty military families on their mortgages, illegally foreclosing on troubled homeowners, and … well, so much more.
So Jamie, you should ask yourself the question about "how fair" is all of the above. Then you should shut up, count your millions, and be grateful you're not in jail.
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This has been reposted from Jim Hightower's website.
