Besides the greed factor; these bubbles have been created to mask the inherent weakness in western economies for the past 25-30 years, particularly in the US and UK. When you have a system in which the vast majority of the population-60-70%- have not had an increase in their wages for many years, leads to disastrous effects on our societies.
The fact that comments about the current financial/housing crisis throughout the msm and blogosphere ignores the underlying human and economical problems tells me we can not avoid a meltdown which may be different from the great depression but nonetheless, the consequences will be widespread and painful. Anotherwards, 'NO ONE GETS OUT OF THIS WITHOUT PAIN'
This is THE key point here. It's the single most relevant way to gut-punch the wave of sleazy, self-serving con-artist crap about reform.
There is no lack of money in the system - even if a fair chunk of it is fictitious, there's enough to still have real value.
But beyond the Anglo Disease we have Anglo Disease squared - another textbook example of explosive economic self-immolation, which seems to be the inevitable and predictable outcome of the 'reform' these snake-oiled chuckleheads are touting as a cure-all.
Constraining upstream cash supply so it stops circulating among the peasants doesn't just bankrupt the peasants - it bankrupts everyone upstream too.
So semi-socialised income distribution, currency stability, long-term investment and regulations that prevent insane lending and even more insane speculation are the only reliable solutions. They may not be as exciting and hungry as a quarter-by-quarter free-for-all, and a tiny minority of not very interesting people will have to give up their private jets.
But by god, they actually work as good solid economic principles, and are somuch less likely to trash the place than anything we've had since WWII.
