Are We Really This Simple?

If you've been following the recent market turmoil closely, a big headline today was the united actions of several international central banks to lower their prime lending rates. The Bank of Canada lowered its overnight lending by half a percent, while the charter banks only dropped theirs by a quarter. This has sparked outrage from the usual suspects, namely those Canadians who love to bitch yet know nothing about why any of this was done.


I'd probably have more luck convincing my living room wall, but once again, it seems very few people actually understand what is happening and why...and even fewer people seem to have any interest in finding out. After all, trashing banks seems to be a typical Canadian passtime. Banks aren't charity organizations and no one is forcing anyone to borrow money...and if borrowing money at 4.5% rather than 4.25% is going to cause you to lose sleep at night, you've all got problems.

In the meantime, I and the millions of Canadians who have directly invested in Canadian banks and indirectly through their pensions/RRSPs owe a debt of gratitude to the Canadian banking sector for not falling into the same trap as many international banks fell into. Our "fat cat" CEOs are bargains with their few million dollar/yr salaries as opposed to gentlemen like the CEO of Lehman Bros. who grossed nearly half a BILLION dollars in a few short years.

Quit your whining people....it's tiresome. If you don't like it, vote for the NDP. Taliban Jack is going to take on our banks and make them and our economy as unprofitable as possible. Won't it be nice to all be poor?