We're All Bankers Now

Mack Hall

Our government has, for reasons of its own, decided that failing banks – meaning their owners in Belgium or Spain, not the employees here in the USA -- should be rescued by the rest of us. Since our taxes will be employed for these endeavors, we, The People (bless us) are now owners of The People’s Banks.

Now that you and I are Owner-Comrade Bankers, shouldn’t we enjoy some of the old-fashioned perqs that go with swelling about as merchant bankers?

I wouldn’t bet on it, not that I could afford to bet. I think our lives as bankers will be the new style:

A banker’s life, old style: The occasional, um, conference in Las Vegas
A banker’s life, new style: Christmas party at Katfish Kloset

A banker’s life, old style: Cash bonuses
A banker’s life, new style: Coupons for two cups of drive-through coffee

A banker’s life, old style: Being greeted at the door by deferential employees
A banker’s life, new style: Being greeted at the door by a sullen security guard wielding an electronic wand that’s been places you really don’t want to know about

A banker’s life, old style: carpeted office with large windows
A banker’s life, new style: wherever you are now, probably with dim, energy-saving, mercury-poisoning, squiggly light bulbs

A banker’s life, old style: showing up for work at eight or nine
A banker’s life, new style: Dragging out of bed at four or five for the long drive to the plant which is due to close before autumn but you’ll have to find money to support the bank anyway

A banker’s life, old style: president of the Rotary Club
A banker’s life, new style: waiter at Rotary Club suppers

A banker’s life, old style: tailored suits
A banker’s life, new style: Nomex

A banker’s life, old style: leisurely luncheons at the club
A banker’s life, new style: a bag of cholesterol from GlopBurger

A banker’s life, old style: walnut-paneled boardrooms
A banker’s life, new style: a quick smoke out back by the dumpster

A banker’s life, old style: Rolex
A banker’s life, new style: Timex

A banker’s life, old style: Mont Blanc
A banker’s life, new style: Mont Bic

A banker’s life, old style: Cole-Haan
A banker’s life, new style: Goodwill

A banker’s life, old style: Private school for your kid in Switzerland
A banker’s life, new style: Hoping your kid can keep his job bagging groceries

A banker’s life, old style: Exchanging bon mots about the old days in the Skull and Bones
A banker’s life, new style: Swapping yarns about the old days in Iraq and Afghanistan

A banker’s life, old style: Skiing in Switzerland every winter
A banker’s life, new style: Disney World. Once. Maybe.

Work hard, my fellow Banker-Comrades; thousands of European and Chinese millionaires are depending on you.

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