Why do some people hate investment banking? Why do so many people hate investment bankers?
Public consensus is that investment bankers make extraordinary profits from seemingly non constructive work. Whereas an outsider can see the broad utility in, say, a carpenter, musicians, teachers, and so on, investment banking can look like a means of making money from the labours of others, without physically doing anything. The disparity between the perceived contribution and the perceived rewards creates a sense of enormous injustice. Investment banking rarely gets much positive press either. We hear when it goes wrong - say Bernie Madoff [1], or the 2008 Financial Crisis - but not say when it fuels the growth of pension funds or the western world for the best part of a century [2]. Contributing to this sense of injustice is the seeming amoral and capricious role the markets themselves play in everyday lives. They may be broadly efficient, but they certainly don't appear to be fair (in the mainstream sense): companies are whimsically merged and thousands let go from their jobs, for instance. Modern capitalism is a complex dynamic system that takes serious effort to understand and risk to profit from. We need smart investment to fuel the incredible market growth behind so much we now take for granted. However these realities are not part of the public consciousness, and the public don't value them. I don't expect they ever will. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ber...[2] http://observationsandnotes.blog...
What did Ocean mean when he said "You shook Sinatra's hand, you should know better" to Willy Bank?
The fiction: Sinatra is allegedly one of the core members who built Vegas. He is allegedly the co-builder of Vegas with Bugsy Siegel and a great friend of John Kennedy with whose influence he remained out of jail even while having a mobster life. He fictionally was the classiest of Mafia leaders of his age. The whole plot was inspired by such allegations as described in the below link of Personal life of Frank Sinatra. In the movie it meant that people who built casinos in Vegas like Banks and Reuben were part of so called elite who were mentored by Frank Sinatra himself the great builder of the Vegas Strip.Personal life of Frank Sinatra - WikipediaThe truth: Lot of this is true too.. he did have connections with Kennedy and also Bugsy at the same time, but how much he was involved in illegal gang activities will always remain a myth.
Why doesn't the State of New Jersey want Tesla to sell cars directly to customers?
Tesla actually has nothing at all to do with this restriction - and in my opinion, they (Tesla) are the ones in the wrong here.State governments have a responsibility of helping their state's economy. Historically, in the automotive sector, dealerships were the way to do this. If Ford or Chevy decided they wanted to cut out the dealerships and sell cars directly to consumers, then that doesn't help the state's economy. No jobs are created, the state doesn't get to tax the sale, and basically NJ and the people who live there get nothing out of that commerce.So the state essentially told the auto manufacturers "If you want to do business here, you to open a dealership here". The rules are the same for all auto manufacturers.Tesla could open a dealership too. They choose not to.Instead, they whine and complain they're being unfairly targeted, that big auto and big government are out to get them, etc. But these are rules that existed long before Tesla came along, and Tesla has decided they don't like those rules. As a result, they don't get to sell their cars in states that have those rules. Don't get me wrong, I'm a huge fan of Tesla and an EV enthusiast, but they're wrong on this one. They've simply decided they don't want to play by the same rules every other auto manufacturer has to.
Why are conservatives typically anti-union?
We’re anti “coerced union membership”.We fully support the use of voluntary collective bargaining in the marketplace, as this is a very capitalistic notion. Workers are just as much capitalists as business owners. They have different jobs and affect different amounts of influence on the marketplace at large, but they are all aiming to utilize scarce resources in the most efficient way possible. This includes utilizing labor, and anything that is demanded in the marketplace is also subject to a collective bargaining power attributed to the respective suppliers (workers).But that is not what modern unions do. They barely utilize collective bargaining. The vast majority of their funding goes towards political (re: progressive) campaigns. Further, many unions in the country force membership. In other words, they force you to pay for the privilege of contributing to a political cause you may or may not agree with (re: it is inconsequential whether you agree or not).This is immoral, pure and simple. It is theft and “ ideological opposition” contribution without consent. Most unions are disingenuous — they aren’t trying to help you realize your true worth in the marketplace. They, like every other bureaucratic institution, attempt to amass more power and control over certain political and economic processes.You know the service you provide is poorly designed when you have to use the threat of the government sword to get people to use that service.Once again… Immoral. It is similar to forcing conservatives to pay for abortions in the form of Planned Parenthood. Or forcing liberals to pay for foreign wars or state-sponsored religious organizations. You can argue that it is necessary (it usually isn’t but that is a different topic) but you can’t argue that it is just.