Morgan on Goldman Sachs?
With bankers, Wall Street, financial regulation, and especially Golden Sachs’ CEO being all the talk these days, a quote from J. P. Morgan (the person) seems in order. Depending on one’s point of view, Morgan was either way ahead of his time or just as greedy (worldly, if you like) as anyone you’ll meet today. Morgan could be callous, but in an honest sort of way. Might the following quote apply to the appearance of Goldman’s CEO before Congress?
“A man always has two reasons for doing anything: a good reason and the real reason.”
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Chris Parker's practice focuses on the representation and counseling of companies in matters pertaining to the workplace and the protection of their intellectual property and trade secrets. In addition to serving as an advocate for clients, Mr. Parker is also trained as a mediator and frequently serves as a third-party neutral.
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Good and real reasons need not cross the line of being unethical and harboring greed.
Thanks for reading my posting. I find your question intriguing. While I have done research on John D. Rockefeller (whose asceticism JP Morgan thought was strange), I have not read on J.P. Morgan. My impression is that Morgan was of brass tacks. It is interesting whether he would have admitted to more than Blankfein did yesterday. I suspect as you do that Morgan would not have been above entertaining the same conflicts of interest (though perhaps he would have hid them better). The age of the “Robber Barons” gave rise to the progressive movement, so we ought not gild the lilies here. If anything, I suspect that modern business ethics is better now because we have gone through the progressive movement (changing societal norms can impact business ethics even if the latter are in themselves not justified by them). In terms of the banks, I think the repeal of the Glass-Steagal Act in the 1990s is particularly important. I suspect that because we dodged the bullet in Sept 08 and the houses are now in some cases even more powerful, Congress and the Prez won’t likely stand up to Wall Street to put the Act back on the books. I think we are setting ourselves up…perhaps even to a return to the robber baron days.
On an unrelated note, I see you have your picture on your blog. I’ve never thought about putting mine on. Your picture looks a bit like David Letterman (I was watching him last night). I also see from your blog that you have a newsletter. I’ve never considered doing one (my cousins have one on the stock market and they do quite well with it). I suppose I’m not much of an entrepreneur. Also, I see you have a link to “other blogs.” I have no clue how it is done, but I would be grateful if you would add mine. I would be glad to add yours. If I need to do anything, pls email me. btw: I just noticed your archives. …and I thought I had a lot of posts! lol
Anyway, thanks for the comment. I don’t normally have comments with my posts because when I tried it initially most tended to be off the wall, so I appreciate yours. I am allowing comments on the posting on Goldman as an experiment to see whether I get good replies. Hopefully any others will be like yours.
Sanjay and Skip,
Thanks much for your comments.
“Need not” could also be “should not” or “must not.” But I suspect the line has already been crossed more than a few times this morning.
J.P. Morgan wasn’t exactly a saint, and I’m pretty sure he wouldn’t have used the above quote in his testimony before Congress. I’m not sure that things are any better today than during the time of the robber barons. It seems to me there are more of them today, and most of their names aren’t known nearly as well as Rockefeller, Morgan, Carnegie and a few others. About my resemblance to David Letterman, I think that’s the first time I’ve been told that. As you may have seen from previous posts, Letterman has been good fodder.
Thanks again for your comments.
John