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Article: Wall Street's New Gilded Age.(Business)(on bank failures and government regulations)
- Article from:
- Newsweek
- Article date:
- September 21, 2009
- Author:
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Byline: Niall Ferguson
A year after the crash, a few financial giants are back to making millions, while average Americans face foreclosure and unemployment. What's wrong with this picture?
Since its birth, the United States has grappled with the problem of an over-mighty financial sector. With the exception of Alexander Hamilton, the Founders' vision was of a republic of self-reliant farmers and small-town tradesmen. The last thing they wanted was for New York to become the London of the New World--a mammon-worshiping metropolis in which financial capital and political capital were rolled into one. That was why there was such resistance to creating a ...