Risk, accountability and bailing out banks

Umair Haque has a nice little piece on the ‘logic’ behind government wanting to bail out banks troubled by the economic downturn.

To me the irony of the situation is startling: When things go well, banks want absolutely no interference from government. When things go wrong they line up to get bolstered by taxpayers money. It’s like saying that we want the profits, but we don’t want to run the real risk of our actions.

Last time I checked that was an utopian business model in a capitalist society, so let’s not screw with that. Accountability? Yes, please.