Because they were at the forefront of innovation in an earlier era, the industry thinks it can stay the same as the world owes it a living - however useless the products and however bad the service provided.
Successful foreign rivals are not models to learn from, but unfair competitors who should be restrained by law.
Unfortunately the end result of this mindset is the more or less complete collapse of the industry concerned.
Finance is - or was - the heavy industry of the late 20th c, complete with a sense of entitlement and constant demands for government support in the form of favourable (de)regulation, cash handouts and bailouts.
The UK's car industry was considered too big to fail - until it did, as a result of shoddiness, corruption, and general uselessness. Thatcher pushed it over the edge deliberately as a result of her war on poor people.
With a few variations, that's where Wall St is today. It's still clinging to the edge of the cliff, and it won't be a US pol who pushes it over the edge. But it's roughly as healthy as Rootes and Leyland were in the 70s.
It would have been unthinkable in the 50s and 60s that these industries could fail as completely as they did. But they did fail. Wall St will too, over the next ten years.
It's now a question of what replaces it. Or more specifically - who gets to decide what replaces it.
Similarly for finance, I think. A vivid image of what should exist acts as a surrogate for reality. Pursuit of the image then prevents pursuit of the reality -- John K. Galbraith
Cars - and dollars - are the side issue. The shift is about attention, the direction in which economies are geared, and who benefits from that direction.
