Robert Kuttner has a great column about the rentier class and the struggle between between the claims of the past and the potential of the future. See responses by Adam Levitin, Mike Konczal, Paul Krugman, Yves Smith, Matt Yglesias.
I want to make an obvious political economy point. The most organized and active agents of the rentier class are, of course, banks. As Konczal points out
"[Financial sector] profits are based off milking the bad debts of the housing and credit bubbles while Americans struggling under a crushing debt load. Instead of sharing the losses, the financial sector has locked itself into the profit stream and left the real economy to deal with the mess."
Financial sector lobbying plays an outsized role in tilting policy away from risk-and-loss-sharing arrangements and towards an alchemy of blood from turnips.
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