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 Originally Posted by Jack Sawyer
Actual criminalization of white collar crimes for starters. What we have now is a few boogiemen paying for every crime, while the rest getting golden parachutes and bonuses.
This incentivises reckless behaviour
While I agree, here's the thing: pinpointing actual crimes committed regarding the 2008 financial crisis and subsequent Great Recession is nigh impossible. I've studied it quite a lot, and I haven't even come across actual crimes. It's hard to even pinpoint things people did wrong. Did lenders and banks do things wrong? Actually, no they didn't. The housing issue preceding 2008 was caused by perverse incentives due to government law and government behavior.* The crash and subsequent recession was caused by the Fed mishandling monetary policy,** which is essentially a mechanism informed by theory (and data and history). People haven't been charged for crimes because they didn't actually commit crimes.
* ** And there is a great deal of debate and uncertainty in the profession about all this. It took the economics profession approximately 40 years to reach consensus that the Fed caused the Great Depression via malfunctioning monetary policy. It was merely an accident or misinformed idea for which no crime was committed. The same essential things happened in 2007-2009, and the profession is slowly learning that the Fed caused the calamity again this time. Crimes committed? Kinda none. Accountability in these areas of policy theory won't come by making not sticking to one theory a crime.
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