Extractive finance debilitating customers and economic recovery

It’s not as simple as changing political parties or leaders, we have to end the finance model that extracts all and justifies everything for its profits, while leaving households, the economy and taxpayers unable to attain financial strength and stability.  The parasite keeps killing the host and captured lawmakers and regulators are accessories to the crimes on both sides of the isle.  See Democratic party head joins conservative campaign to derail modest payday loan regulations:

“Payday lenders fearing modest federal regulations will cut into their vast profit margins have a new, high-profile ally in Washington: The chairwoman of the Democratic Party.

Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL) is co-sponsoring legislation to delay and permanently muffle pending Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) rules to rein in small-dollar lenders that are currently able to levy triple-digit annual interest rates on the nation’s poorest, the Huffington Post reports.”

Posted in Main Page | Comments Off on Extractive finance debilitating customers and economic recovery

The Current: ADHD and mental health

We have had a lot of personal experience with ADHD in our family. Getting the condition properly diagnosed, understood and treated can be literally life transforming for girls and boys. Discovering solutions sooner than later is important in limiting the negative feedback loop that so often develops in school, social and work settings and then can undermine personal success, self-esteem and confidence. There are many adults today that have never been diagnosed. We are never too old to seek help.  The discussion in this segment touches on the experiences of kids and adults.

While ADHD has long been portrayed as a disorder afflicting hyperactive boys who have trouble sitting still, doctors are learning more about the way it manifests in females — and why so many girls and women with the disorder go undiagnosed.   Here is a direct audio link.

Posted in Main Page | Comments Off on The Current: ADHD and mental health

High frequency cheaters investing in their infrastructure

Why not invest hundreds of millions to lay cable and erect microwave towers when it allows you to skim billions off legitimate participants trying to use public financial markets for investing every millisecond of every day. Good gig when you can rig it for sure. As for why law enforcement and supposed regulators are allowing the rest of us to be robbed and raped by these fraudsters, well that’s easy:  they are bought and paid for by those on the make.  Any one else have a problem with any of this? Well you should, because if you aren’t an HFT firm, then you are the patsy.   See Rural residents fight traders’ plans for masts as high as Shard:

Vigilant Global and New Line Networks (NLN) want to build communications towers to shave milliseconds off the time it takes to make multimillion-dollar trades.

But their proposals have met with dismay from locals, who are opposed to the idea of the “eyesore” masts in their neighbourhood.

The two firms, who build ultra-fast cable networks that hedge funds and investment banks pay to use, have submitted planning applications for the masts near Richborough. They hope that the giant structures, both more than 1,000ft high, will win them business from high-frequency traders, known as “flash boys”.

High-frequency trading is a form of financial transaction that uses powerful computers to make large trades as quickly as possible. It requires ultra-fast data transfer, in some cases not much slower than the speed of light, that allows traders to steal a march on rivals by closing deals fractionally quicker.

Posted in Main Page | Comments Off on High frequency cheaters investing in their infrastructure