The Laissez Faire approach to managing the world has always said that Government needs to get out of the way of business and let the experts get on with generating wealth.
I have to say that I would have subscribed to that view, even with socialist leanings, for my entire City career. Not out of vested interest (at least i thik not) but because if we were to have the funds available, as a society to provide for the education and health of ordinary people then we needed to have businesses allowed to get on with business, so long as they did';t get Laissez-ed to Faire tax-evasion, we were all going to do OK.
Of course the sub-prime mega-fraud (well surely it cannot have been mega-stupidity can it? These guys are geniuses earning £9 mill a year?) and the ridiculous activities of RBS makes the conceot of Laissez Faire look highly dangerous. Because it only works if the system has integrity. Anyone who can spot integrity in the banking world has a microscope on LSD as far as I can see.
But then my dear mate Barack Obama shows us that government cannot be left alone either.
Reports released (and highlighted in the FT here) show tat the White House made mistake after mistake in the response to the Gulf oil spill. Misled the public about the disaster, wasted money in the response and "confused the chain of command".
Everyone knows I think BP are generally a pretty poor example of cutting edge management, but they scored massively over government in the integrity of their response to the disaster.
So where does this leave us?
Government puts politics ahead of the public
Banking put bonuses ahead of the shareholder or the public.
Are we doomed as a society because no one has integrity?
The clever Mrs Bozo pointed out to me the other day that, in the NFL they have six officials managing the 22 players. One official for every 3.7 players!
Why? Because if you don;t, they will cheat.
What does that tell us about banking regulation?
It tells us that we need to spend more gazillions a year on regulation than we do on health.
It really would be much cheaper to have a set of bankers who believed in ethics.
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