Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/5/84; site psuvax1.UUCP
Path: utzoo!lsuc!watmath!clyde!cbosgd!ukma!psuvm.bitnet!psuvax1!berman
From: berman@psuvax1.UUCP (Piotr Berman)
Newsgroups: net.politics.theory
Subject: Re: capitalism vs. democracy???
Message-ID: <1951@psuvax1.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 6-Jan-86 00:20:16 EST
Article-I.D.: psuvax1.1951
Posted: Mon Jan  6 00:20:16 1986
Date-Received: Wed, 8-Jan-86 19:50:32 EST
References: <261@gargoyle.UUCP> <286@frog.UUCP> <267@gargoyle.UUCP> <1793@teddy.UUCP> <27@cascade.ARPA> <1924@psuvax1.UUCP> <343@l5.
Organization: Pennsylvania State Univ.
Lines: 27

> In article <1931@psuvax1.UUCP> berman@psuvax1.UUCP (Piotr Berman) writes:
> >
> >As a rotten relativist, I open Even Better Bank & Trust open day and
> >night, only to vanish after accepting first 1 million dollars in
> >deposits (no, I am rather honest, I wold rather return from the
> >futures exchange and say: sorry, I lately realized that currency
> >futures are not conservative investments after all).  Not only I will
> >deprive my depositors of the product of their toil, I will also
> >scare to death your depositors.
>
> I don't think so.  What will happen is that I will advertise that I am
> trustworthy and you are not.  It is difficult to build a reputation for
> trustworthiness (in that it doesn't happen in a hurry) but it is difficult
> to lose one in a hurry as well.  Maybe I should run the banking division of
> Pinkertons or Brinks...
>
> Laura Creighton

The futures exchange example is real: a guy in San Diego managed to loose
upward $100,000,000 in such a scheme, and money belonged to so-called
"sophisticated investors".

The claim that trustworthiness cannot be lost in a flash is false: witness
the run on state chartered banks in Ohio after one of them got bancrupt:
the others could be very prudent, but it did not help much.

Piotr Berman