I’m getting off the media/Southern beat a moment to pontificate about the Bear Stearns collapse on Wall Street, which is tied to the subprime mortgage meltdown.
I feel qualified to do this as I once worked for Morgan Stanley and held the essential Series 7 NASD license. I also am a human being with a large dose of common sense who sees both big corporations and ordinary folks keep making the same mistakes.
ABC’s “Good Morning America” recently estimated that the average Bear Stearns employee’s retirement stake in the company will now be worth about 10% of what it was before the collapse. Consumer advisors such as Atlanta’s Clark Howard long have preached that people should not overinvest in their own companies. Remember Enron? WorldCom?
Still, the federal bailout there is far more generous than what is being given to American people under the guise of “economic stimulus.” (Make that ”election year bribe.”). Kudos to ABC’s Diane Sawyer for letting a couple with an infant child grill Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson about the matter.
Reality check: When the economy’s good, nobody … not the Feds or most citizens … will be asking why. When some of the greed backfires, there won’t be a safety net. Caveat emptor.
