Euro Cheddar

Every day, politicians of the wealthiest nations are trying to claw back some control over the free-wheeling banking sectors that ostensibly got us in this recession in the first place. Regulations, it seems, are the order of the day. But what can be imposed on the capitalist theme park of big business banking?

This kind of talk is making banks and investors – especially those that have paid back the government bail-outs – upset at the “interference” of the federal, in what is ostensibly free market practice. In the U.S., this has always been a particularly touchy area. The “S word” (socialism) can’t even appear to be a speck on the horizon, or the cowboys start loading guns and circling the wagons. Only now, after it took such a lame duck President as Bush, and such a monumental global shake-up, could someone like Obama even have the slimmest chance of trying to socialize health care and cap executive bonuses.

It had to be this way. The public in both Europe and America are still baying for banker blood. With unemployment still hugely problematic, politicians have to put their foot down, or else answer to the mob. And only the most savvy leader will be able to balance big business growth (and in Obama’s case, fundraising powers etc.) with keeping the public happy.

Still, institutions like Goldman Sachs, who have paid back daddy for the loan, are able to get back to business as usual. As reported in the British press, Vice Chairman of Goldman Sachs International, Lord Griffiths, said at a recent press conference that the culture of bonuses shouldn’t be admonished, but rather encouraged, as we should “tolerate the inequality as a way to achieve greater prosperity for all”. No surprise that he was a former advisor to Thatcher.

Regardless, there is a balancing act necessary between big businesses and government, and my guess is that it will become increasingly precarious over the next several years.

• Meet CEO of Goldman Sachs – the U.S. Government Welfare King (iflizwerequeen.com)