Where has all the money gone?

Long time passing,

When will we ever learn?………..is that Bob Dylan I hear in the background?

In an unusually frank article published in Saturday’s New York Times, the newspaper’s economic columnist, Joe Nocera, reveals what he calls “the dirty little secret of the banking industry”–namely, that “it has no intention of using the [government bailout] money to make new loans.”

As Nocera explains, the plan announced October 13 by Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson to hand over $250 billion in taxpayer money to the biggest banks, in exchange for non-voting stock, was never really intended to get them to resume lending to businesses and consumers–the ostensible purpose of the bailout. Its essential aim was to engineer a rapid consolidation of the American banking system by subsidizing a wave of takeovers of smaller financial firms by the most powerful banks.

Nocera cites an employee-only conference call held October 17 by a top executive of JPMorgan Chase, the beneficiary of $25 billion in public funds. Nocera explains that he obtained the call-in number and was able to listen to a recording of the proceedings, unbeknownst to the executive, whom he declines to name.

“It is starting to appear,” the Times columnist writes, “as if one of the Treasury’s key rationales for the recapitalization program–namely, that it will cause banks to start lending again–is a fig leaf…. In fact, Treasury wants banks to acquire each other and is using its power to inject capital to force a new and wrenching round of bank consolidation.”

Early this month, he explains, “in a nearly unnoticed move,” Paulson, the former CEO of Goldman Sachs, put in place a new tax break worth billions of dollars that is designed to encourage bank mergers. It allows the acquiring bank to immediately deduct any losses on the books of the acquired bank.

In a nationally televised speech delivered September 24, in advance of the congressional vote on the bailout plan, Bush said it would “help American consumers and businessmen get credit to meet their daily needs and create jobs.” If the bailout was not passed, he warned, “More banks could fail, including some in your community. The stock market would drop even more, which would reduce the value of your retirement account…. More businesses would close their doors, and millions of Americans could lose their jobs … ultimately, our country could experience a long and painful recession.”

One month later, the bailout has been enacted, and all of the dire developments–banks and businesses disappearing, the stock market plunging, unemployment skyrocketing–which the American people were told it would prevent are unfolding with accelerating speed.

While no serious measures are being proposed, either by the Bush administration, the Republican presidential candidate or his Democratic opponent, to prevent a social catastrophe from overtaking working people, the government is organizing a restructuring of the financial system that will enable a handful of mega-banks to increase their power over society.

Once again I ask, When will we ever learn?