What kind of inside job is he talking about

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Think for example how often you watch a feature length movie that features a very entertaining and funny first half only to be let down by a lacklustre second half. It won this year's Oscar for best documentary and even just seeing the reviews on this page compelled me to track it down. After seeing it I did feel rather disappointed.

Yeah sure it's a well made documentary featuring cinematography that should been nominated in its own right and thankfully it doesn't feature a smug Michael Moore like figure revolving around the lowest emotional denominator but there's something missing Not just something missing but too much added. When I say added what I mean is the fundamental problem that brought on the crisis is the lack of regulation in both the world banking system and the derivatives market.

Once you know this things start making sense. Unfortunately this lack of regulation is continually brought up featuring an endless stream of names and players you might eventually end up confused as to who's who and what they had to do with the world economic crisis.

American politicians from Reagen to Dubya And thankfully Clinton is portrayed as being bad as anyone else if not worse allowed more and more carte blanche economic neo-liberals with a cocaine habit to use what's effectively guess work and gambling to run the world economy which led to the present crisis we're in? It's all down to a lack of regulation? Okay can we move please because I think the point was made ten minutes ago. Oh we'll be getting the same point made slightly differently in another ten minutes?

Oh dear There's also a lack of human drama involved but I do respect director Charles Ferguson for not going down the obvious and manipulative road of editing victims of the present economic crash being cross cut with the justification of the economists and bankers saying the bonuses and salaries they receive as being deserved in anyway. This might be another filing however. Here in Britain the outcome of the slump is that all the major banks have effectively been nationalised and it's taxpayers money that has kept them afloat for the last couple of years.

One hope's to see a rather more cogent documentary on the subject in the near future. As a way to illustrate the debacle of the American economic system, Charles Ferguson, the director of "Inside Job", takes us to review what happened in Iceland, a country that up to recently was one of the best run places on earth.

It appears that when banks were allowed to begin unorthodox practices that only served to enrich the higher executives of those institutions, the money entrusted by the plain folks saw their deposits at risk because the greed of the higher ups who decided to put the money on all sorts of illegal schemes, thus bringing a crisis of gigantic proportions.

The culprit in America's case came from a financial system that allowed banks to bet against their clients' interests. While people kept losing money, firms like Goldman Sachs, were getting richer and richer by going in the opposite direction they were telling their customers to act.

The selling of worthless mortgages ultimately brought down a lot of prestigious companies that had been in business for quite a long time, leaving their employees out of work, as well as the whole country on the brink of the worst chaos in its history. Charles Ferguson points his finger at a lot of figures in the government, past and present, without hesitation.

Yet, most of the people responsible for the melt down are still around in key positions today. What is worse, the people responsible for causing it, were able to keep the millions they made while ruining the nation.

The documentary is an eye opener, even for those of us with limited notions of how things worked in those high spheres of finance. Matt Damon narrates. Brilliant documentary on the causes of the Global Financial Crisis of Damning in its examination of the greed, conflicts of interest, apathy, mismanagement, corruption and sheer criminal activity that drove the event, and which, unfortunately, still pervades the financial services industry today. Well researched, with well-crafted interviews and illuminating background material.

Hardly a stone is left unturned. Definitely worth watching. In decades to come, this movie will be the chronicle of the earlys.

Greetings again from the darkness. What director Charles Ferguson and writers Chad Beck and Adam Bolt deliver is an emotional expose' into the faces behind the financial crisis and a quick education on the basic causes. This is not an in-depth thesis put together by a Harvard economist The emotions ranged from sadness to anger to disgust. There are even moments of laughter as these blatantly arrogant types weakly attempt to defend themselves - at least those courageous enough to submit to an interview.

The point the filmmakers clearly set out to prove is that the mess was a collaboration of politicians including Presidents , Ratings Agencies, Investment Managers, leaders of Banking giants, the Federal Reserve, the Boards of Directors from Financial Services conglomerates and the once sacred Academic leaders. The film asks the question: "Who can we trust? What we can do is learn, demand changes and hold accountable those responsible.

The film give a brief outline of derivatives, CDO's, the mortgage mess, and how the Ratings agencies' "opinions" led to the demise of many jobs, nest eggs, and long-standing companies. In fact, they purposefully withheld information and misled the general public into making investment decisions that knowingly stood no chance at success for anyone but the Investment firms.

Since distrust of politicians and corporate types has been rampant for years, I believe one of the most disappointing revelations was the pulling back of the curtain on the Academic world. Those thought to be unbiased analysts and commentators have been exposed to be highly paid consultants for the very people manipulating the markets.

It is important to note that no President goes untouched here - from Reagan forward. If you believe Obama to be above this mess, you would be mistaken. Much of his official financial advisory group is composed of the very same players responsible for the deceit these past few years.

Think it's going to change? Those in charge clearly bring truth to the words "Greed is good". They have no sense of right and wrong.

They give no consideration to making the world a better place. What matters is how much better can they make their own life. The segment on Lehman executive Richard Fuld summed it up best. His day was planned so that he only had 3 to 4 seconds exposure to real people ShadeGrenade 28 June Written and directed by Charles Ferguson, and narrated by Matt Damon, 'Inside Job' is an absorbing documentary about the global financial melt-down of It is structured in three parts - before, during, and after.

The story it tells is astonishing, and will leave you angry as indeed it should. We learn how bankers influenced the U. Government to remove the controls on deregulation, and an orgy of lending ensued, with devastating consequences. As bank after bank collapsed, a depression akin to the '30's swept across the world. It should be compulsive viewing for all those newspaper editors currently waging war on so-called 'benefit cheats'.

The millions the bankers walked off with makes the sums handed out to the dole claimants look minuscule. Equally depressing is the fact that these same people not only eluded jail but were later reappointed by President Obama.

Do yourself a favour and see this film. No end in sight jdesando 8 November In many cases, they can't. But such mistakes are only a symptom Charles Ferguson reveals of the world-wide financial crisis, which involves high-ranking government officials like Larry Summers and Timothy Geithner increasing their power while the policies they make cause certain harm to the people like us who have trusted them.

Dispiriting are the derivative dispersal and shameful sub-prime lending that directly led to the breakdown of middle-class wealth while the purveyors of this massacre walked away with billions and no indictments. The Ponzi schemes of Kenneth Lay, Bernie Madoff, and their ilk are but small components of the charade that drew millions of hard-working, well-meaning citizens into debt and financial ruin as the value of their most cherished retirement vehicle, home value, dissipated right in front of their eyes.

Ferguson's documentary style is to remain behind the camera while letting the notables indict themselves. Unlike Michael Moore, he cares not to intrude or make a character of himself, something like Citizen Kane's reporter Thompson. Except when in a moment of profound pique he challenges the disaffection of Frederic Mishkin, a former member of the Federal Reserve Board of Governors: "I'm sorry, I'm sure that your textbook is important and widely read, but didn't you think that more important things were going on in the world?

As I demanded of him to present the other side of the financial crisis, I couldn't think of what he could say to counter the welter of facts indicting those in front of his camera. Give it your best shot! StevePulaski 5 June When I first saw Charles Ferguson's Inside Job, I got lost in its concepts, its economic jargon, and its lengthy, drawn-out explanation of the financial crisis North America, and pretty much the world, was impacted by. After a semester of AP advanced placement Macroeconomics under my belt, I return with the idea that I think I know anything and everything about macroeconomics, the economy, and approach Inside Job with more of a knowledge about its terms.

This is the kind of film that is reminiscent of one of those social clubs downtown where, if you try to jump in with no background knowledge as to what some of the basics of the club are, you're going to be lost in the shuffle.

The film attempts to explain to the average person - who bears some understanding of the American macroeconomic system - why the last few years have been painful, why the recovery has been lengthy and ostensibly nonexistent, and why the financial crash occurred in the first place. I won't begin to try to summarize it here for several reasons: it could spawn a plethora of confusion, the explanation, even in a simple sense, deserves its own separate blog post, and that's what the film is for in the first place.

I will say that the film's main point of why we entered such a crippling recession in the first place was because of banks marketing heavy loans to people they knew couldn't afford them. The loans were called "subprime loans," and even the issuers of the loans were betting against the casual American investor who bought into the scheme. Millions defaulted on their mortgage payments and their loans, and as a result, the housing market crashed and we were left with millions in a dire financial turmoil.

The field of economics is, in my opinion, alienating beyond belief, because, much like science, it seems every single sentence in an article bears three or four words you don't understand.

When trying to find definitions on those words, you are lost and wayward in trying to find the meaning of other words that were given in the definitions of the words you initially didn't understand. To top it all off, even on the news, you hear about murder, drugs, suicide, war, terror, the weather, and so on - everything that seems much more active and interesting than hearing that "the DOW dropped 'x' amount of points today.

Furthermore, the film details how during the time of the massive economic downturn, the field of economics lost a great deal of credibility because economists decided to write false reports and deliver false ideas on the economy's progress and current state for others, all working to swindle the common American investor and work for only ones personal gang.

It's a cruel and unusual truth that, as a result, put a damper on an unbelievably valuable field that teaches one how to conserve and utilize current resources. The only concern of my was the way the film was edited, which seemed to be geared towards giving some people less opportunity to speak.

Some interviews are cut off right after a question is asked, which usually happens after one of the talking head economists says something stupid. One thing I'm beginning to notice about documentaries is how editing plays a big part in the message they convey, and I couldn't help but feel that editors Chad Beck and Adam Bolt cut out crucial additional material that would've further shed light on certain circumstances, rather than stopping at one of the economist's poorly-worded answers.

If anything, the film goes on to illustrate the idea that there is no one you can't trust but yourself in today's world. The Wall Street brokers and investors couldn't care less about you, as they spend a hefty part of their salaries and your investments on high-end hookers, drugs, and Girls Gone Wild tapes, the economists want to work in lockstep with those giving them the biggest kickbacks, and even the wealthy CEOs of banks we've all heard of can orchestrate large schemes but still can barely answer a simple question without fumbling the words.

It's a frightening world we live in nowadays, one that, despite more awareness to many social issues and one that tries to emphasize safety, is still extremely reckless in many respects. Inside Job, in a documentary's sense, is one big, angry, well-stated argument that makes an attempt to clarify all the information one needs to know about the financial crisis and even attempts to place blame on the individuals that apparently caused such a crisis.

It's a hefty goal for itself, and the film really shouldn't succeed as well as it does. However, through clarity, a brisk-pace, and the ability to give us a clear indication on why this film impacts each and every one of us deserves praise that should simply not be shortchanged.

It's an important picture; arguably the most important you'll see in a specific year. Narrated by: Matt Damon. Directed by: Charles Ferguson. Director Charles Ferguson really scores a touchdown here with this revealing and truth telling doc that will make you as a viewer angry when you see the behind the scenes story of what contributed to the economic meltdown of Narrated by actor Matt Damon this doc is well researched with interviews from economic insiders, politicians, and media people.

It tells step by step of the meltdown of global economics of , with a cost of over 20 trillion causing an impact in which many lose not only their jobs, but homes also. Most telling is the business of seeing how the government has no regulations over financial companies and how that many firms merge together to form an unstoppable force in which they can cheat and defraud millions.

And interesting is seeing the conflict of interest as many professors, and politicians will not investigate and fight companies as many serve on boards of the economic companies. One was the vilification of individual people.

Chuck Prince , the CEO of Citigroup at the time of the crisis, may have been overpaid — but I don't think he was particularly at fault. At worst he perhaps should have known more about what was going on, but really he's just the nice old geezer at the top who shakes people's hands at cocktail parties. There may be people lower down who knowingly did criminal things, but that is a different matter.

A weak point was the anti-free market and conspiratorial tone of the film. Yes, deregulation did go too far — particularly with the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act of , which might have prevented banks gambling with depositors' money. But to imply that all deregulation in the last 20 years was a conspiracy perpetrated by an academic elite of economists in the pay of the banks is paranoid and absurd.

An oversight by the film was to ignore how risk managers at many banks knowingly failed to voice their fears about the way their companies operated. A risk manager once told me that to raise an issue that undermined the bank's multi-billion-dollar profits would have been to "sign his own death warrant".

This inability to challenge trading desks generating billions in phantom profits was endemic. Inside Job clearly catches some of the anti-banker mood, and the public is quite right to be outraged at how banks refinanced at the taxpayers' expense are paying outsized bonuses.

Staff at banks such as RBS should be retained by longer-term incentive schemes such as the one being introduced at Barclays. But, as a free marketeer, I believe banks that have not taken public money should be able to do as they please within the law.

Ian Hart was a Wall St derivatives trader, before becoming a head-hunter for, among other banks, Lehman Brothers. He now runs Sacred Microdistillery. It laid the blame squarely where it belongs — at the feet of bankers, of ratings agencies, of regulators — and it interviewed a lot of heavyweight people, such as Dominique Strauss-Kahn , Eliot Spitzer , Raghuram Rajan and Glenn Hubbard.

It will doubtless make many people — especially those who lost their jobs and savings — angry at not only what the banks did, but that many of the people responsible are still in their jobs, and that no one's gone to prison.

It beggars belief that ordinary taxpayers are facing higher taxes and spending cuts, while bankers walked away scot-free. The film shows that people who had bought a house they couldn't afford are now living in a tent, whereas bankers have still got their jobs. Consumers enjoyed buying houses that ultimately they couldn't afford, but mortgages were shoved down their throats without any care on the part of the bankers.

In the old days, the bank would say: "We don't think you can afford that mortgage, so we won't lend you money. Unfortunately, it's clear that for many investment banks business continues pretty much as normal and that another crisis is only a matter of time.

In the post-Reagan period of deregulation the investment banks or lenders sold the loans to investors who in turn gambled trillions of dollars on the unregulated market. In some cases this ratio was , meaning that some banks were borrowing 33 times their own holdings leaving them hopelessly over-extended when the bubble burst.

In addition to the failings of the sector to regulate itself, Inside Job identifies two other factors crucial to the financial collapse and the failure to prevent it. This is largely the consequence of key government appointments being offered to high-ranking sector insiders. Second, the documentary rightly excoriates the academic community in the US which, like the government and the banking sector, became a cheerleader for deregulation and refused to expose the growing liabilities of the banks and the risks to their stakeholders, mostly ordinary Americans with savings, loans and pensions.

He is reduced to gibberish nonsense when trying to explain payments from private financial institutions for academic papers that conflicted with the realities of the sector before the crisis.