Silly article

This is a silly article, but I'll post about it here anyway:

"Did Asperger’s help cause the crisis?"
http://blogs.reuters.com/great-debate/2 ... =debatehub

Made me laugh at least.

"For people on the Asperger’s spectrum this is far less true; regardless of what people are talking about at cocktail parties, they won’t believe that we can all grow rich by buying up one another’s houses, nor will they take assurances from “authorities” as the final word. Having less fear of looking stupid than the rest of us, they will stand by what they perceive. They are also, at least in my experience, far less likely than the average person to hold a position cynically; because it benefits them rather than because they believe it.

That might not be the only type of person you want in a financial system, but those are some pretty valuable characteristics for a fund manger or banking regulator."

I think that's a very fair point. I've worked in the financial sector and for years I've been going on about the pyramid building they've been doing and they wouldn't listen. The reason I was let go was because I was seen as a trouble maker when management were inflated their returns just to get bigger bonuses. A four year old could see through deception it was so obvious.

Do you seriously believe that people with Asperger's Syndrome permeate the financial systems though? That's what the article seems to imply, right? I really just cannot see it. What I do see in the financial system is social, intelligent people who are greedy. They appear aloof and such because most of them are probably from rich backgrounds and have always been pampered. Anyway, all that I've just said here is a generalisation and is most likely to be false... ...

I think the piece I quoted was reasonable. The first few paragraphs were, shall we say, illusionary

'S funny,

I've been predicting the current crisis since 2001 based simply on the idea that if you push house prices up and up, you'll eventually reach a point where people at the bottom of the housing ladder can no longer afford to get on the first step. As those already on the ladder are pushed up by those joining at the bottom, the system collapses when you reach this point.

Aspies are reckoned to be logical, harsh thinkers and to me, the above is obvious. I've spent the last 9 years telling NTs that I know that it'll all go horribly tits up on a collosal scale at some point but they seemed to think I was scaremongering.

The real cause of the economic collapse was greed and avarice, pure and simple, neither of which are exclusively aspie traits. I call shennanigans.

I'd been saying for several years before it went tits-up that it can't carry on like it was - for all the same reasons as Joolz - once your average first time buyer can't buy with a sensible multiple of an average income, it's just a matter of time.

That said, my missus is quite a smart cookie, and she's always gone against the "conventional" advice* given by the financial industry (despite her doing a job where she might be checking bank statements of £40 million a DAY) (on a salary not much better than minimum wage I might add). As a result, we cleared the mortgage on one house about 3 years ago and saved hard in the run-up to the collapse - she'd been checking the housing market, and we bought a new(er) bigger one in February last year, right at the time the market bottomed out (which was pure luck).

* when we tried to make the appointment to clear the mortgage, we ended up in a short conversation about needing to replace the bathroom, and the girl in the bank said to "just stick it on the mortgage" - she looked at us as though we were crazy when we stuck to our guns. I'd love to have seen her face 2 years later :-p

And no, I still haven't settled into the new place :-} - I told my missus from the start it might take me about 3 years to feel comfortable in it...

The takeover of Cadbury by Kraft - Cadbury loses its reputation, Kraft gets mired in massive debt, Cadbury's workers get laid off - guess who wins? The banks financing the takeover. Surprise!

Lofty wrote:The takeover of Cadbury by Kraft - Cadbury loses its reputation, Kraft gets mired in massive debt, Cadbury's workers get laid off - guess who wins? The banks financing the takeover. Surprise!

Hehe..

The banks always win. The thing that cracked me up was the assertion that what's good for the city is good for the country and removing all the restrictions on their behaviour. How gullible would you have to be to believe that the city would have our interests at heart when you can behave irresponsibly and be rewarded with a new Ferrari every year?

I'm crap at judging other people's intentions but even I could see that one coming, LOL.

Chucky wrote:Do you seriously believe that people with Asperger's Syndrome permeate the financial systems though? That's what the article seems to imply, right? I really just cannot see it. What I do see in the financial system is social, intelligent people who are greedy. They appear aloof and such because most of them are probably from rich backgrounds and have always been pampered. Anyway, all that I've just said here is a generalisation and is most likely to be false... ...

If anything, I'd suspect psychopathy rather than Asperger's. I cut the defining characteristics out of Wikipedia.

Factor 1
Aggressive narcissism

1. Glibness/superficial charm
2. Grandiose sense of self-worth
3. Pathological lying
4. Cunning/manipulative
5. Lack of remorse or guilt
6. Emotionally shallow
7. Callous/lack of empathy
8. Failure to accept responsibility for own actions

Factor 2
Socially deviant lifestyle

1. Need for stimulation/proneness to boredom
2. Parasitic lifestyle
3. Poor behavioral control
4. Promiscuous sexual behavior
5. Lack of realistic, long-term goals
6. Impulsiveness
7. Irresponsibility
8. Juvenile delinquency
9. Early behavioral problems
10. Revocation of conditional release

If you're going to fill your pockets creating the perfect conditions to screw up an entire planets financial systems then deny responsibility, blaming everyone that isn't you even though you're supposedly a financial genius, then claim that no-one could have seen it coming when many did, while simultaneously stating that even though you were part of the cause, you still deserve an eight figure bonus and even after this, STILL feel no shame or guilt whatsoever, it would seem to be the closest fit.