Fat cat crooks ought to be locked up

So, after paying $20 billion in fines to the feds, the JP Morgan board of directors gives Jamie Dimon a big, fat pay raise. I guess $11 million a year wasn’t enough for Dimon. The board wanted to reward him for all the fraud investigations and huge penalties. It’s just the cost of doing business for the largest banks that brought the economy to a standstill in 2008. Never mind the pain felt by Main Street. Keeping the fat cats on Wall street happy is obviously more important.

Clearly, fines don’t deter Wall Street bankers. They pay them, charge more fees, and move on to earn even more salary and bonuses. No problem. The banks get bigger, the CEO’s get wealthier because there are no real consequences. The fat cats get to buy another house and hide their money overseas to avoid paying taxes. Don’t worry about Main Street. Unemployment, foreclosures, income inequality aren’t a concern for the greedy masters of the financial universe.

I think that incarceration is the only way to prevent the fat cats from ruining the economy and destroying the country. If they commit fraud, lock them up. Why should they be exempt from personal responsibility? If incarceration is a deterrent for thieves, drug smugglers and murderers, why isn’t it for Wall Street fat cats that torpedoed the economy and damaged millions of lives?

Tom Minnerick

Elgin