I'm not particularly concerned about unfair gains made possible by insider knowledge. The economy is large enough, and the set of lawmakers (not to mention leadership-level lawmakers!) small enough, that that the overall effect on anything is going to be negligible.
My concern would be that the "skill" we're seeing isn't with using insider information, but with using their power to alter outcomes to make whatever investments they'd previously chosen become profitable post hoc. If they're causing our regulatory landscape to be change to pad their wallets, that's going to have a much greater effect on our overall system than just being able to make a trade a day earlier than the rest of us.
> I'm not particularly concerned about unfair gains made possible by insider knowledge.
I am. I work at a company that trades publicly. My wife works at a firm. I can’t do anything with my stocks outside of three weeks a quarter. I can never buy options. My wife has to clear her positions with whatever department. If I have these obstacles, congress should absolutely have them — maybe more. Ideally they can trade index funds and that’s about it.
> If I have these obstacles, congress should absolutely have them
This jealousy is a minor issue, though. There's no reason for you to believe Congresspeople should have exactly the same limitations and opportunities that you have. This is in fact a discussion that involves limiting them from doing things that you would retain the right to do.
It’s not jealousy, it’s equality. If insider trading is illegal, then it should be illegal for everyone and Congress should be no exception. They have even more opportunities and insider knowledge, about many more companies than I do. It absolutely affects how they govern, they tend to be more corrupt because they don’t have to abide by the same regulations that a civilian does.
Yeah, your equality really is just jealousy. It's your feeling that the situation is unfair. But there's no principle of nature that says that things must be fair.
For me, if I can improve the lot of everyone by at least X%, but doing so means that some few people will actually get a benefit of 2X%, that's a darn good deal. Withholding the potential X% from those poor people just because it's not fair seems rather cruel. We may have the luxury of wanting things to be fair, but there are some people for whom those X% will make all the difference.
> Yeah, your equality really is just jealousy. It's your feeling that the situation is unfair. But there's no principle of nature that says that things must be fair.
By that logic why have equality for anything? Why even have civil rights if you can just be like “that’s just the way it is, why should you be able to vote? I’ll vote for the best of all our interests”. It doesn’t work that way.
> For me, if I can improve the lot of everyone by at least X%, but doing so means that some few people will actually get a benefit of 2X%, that's a darn good deal.
In an altruistic society, maybe. But economic theory is based on the idea that everyone will try to do what’s best for them and not for the masses. Congress sets the laws - so they are more interested in benefiting themselves than anyone else. Therefore we need a forcing function, and one way would be to clamp down on insider trading.
But we should be concerned shouldn't we? These people are exempt from laws, they and their presecessors made, for which they will happily condemn the common person and profit again when you pay for your crime.
These people are exempt from laws, they and their presecessors made
Well, that's the problem, right there. We shouldn't be thinking about making new laws that they also won't subject themselves to. We should be thinking about shoring up the rule of law, and ensuring that they are always held accountable.
Unfortunately, today's partisan politics prevents that from happening. The partisans - on BOTH sides - behave as if it's more important that their own side appear faultless and all guilt falls on their opponent. So partisans ensure that those on their own side will get a free pass.
> that that the overall effect on anything is going to be negligible.
It's not the effect on the market you should be worried about. It's the effect on democracy. If you have a culture of people comfortable with doing very well thank you off the back of the broad knowledge they have access to that is not-quite-non-public-but-buried-in-the-minutes, then you are tolerating the first tier of the rot.
The second tier of the rot is insider trading.
The third tier is the insider trading that is happening when nobody cares, like in the current regime.
The third tier of the rot is the grift. You can see the grift happening now.
You have to go broken-windows-policy on this or you have nothing.
My concern would be that the "skill" we're seeing isn't with using insider information, but with using their power to alter outcomes to make whatever investments they'd previously chosen become profitable post hoc. If they're causing our regulatory landscape to be change to pad their wallets, that's going to have a much greater effect on our overall system than just being able to make a trade a day earlier than the rest of us.