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Corruption essay in america
Political corruption in the USA
Political corruption in the USA
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According to the reading known as ‘The Anatomy of a Murder: Who Killed America’s Economy’, the author states that there are a variety of causations which influenced and provided an impact through the US financial system. For instance, the banks, the investors, the credit rating agencies, the regulators, the mortgage brokers, and the politicians are explained in his article. Moreover, the author mentions that there are some significant factors such as the financial regulations and political systems which relate with the financial crisis.
However, even the author does provide the result of who should be blamed as the bankers, but there are no sufficient information about the blame in large companies as Enron and Lehman Brothers which also played significant role as well. One of significant reason that gives raise of this issue is a ‘moral hazard’ played a primary motivation in banks and top brass during the US and the global financial crisis. As a result of this issue provides a collapse of large companies and banks which leads to the financial crisis.
Moreover, the author does not explain any financial crimes which should be addressed as a main factor such as tax evasion plays significant role in the global financial system. It is because of tax evasion is a product of financial crime and that lead to a result of financial crisis.
Further, the author does not provide any information in a form of the financial regulation and financial organizations which should be explained as a main idea in the financial crisis. The author does not explain well in the case of how to prevent against the financial crisis, because the view of his article usually covers the main part of ‘whom to blame and what caused’ rather than how to pr...
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...ark,’The Enron Collapse: An Overview of Financial Issues’ (Research Report, Congressional Research Service, 28 March 2002)
Komisar, Lucy, ‘Profit Laundering and Tax Evasion’ (2005) 52(2) Dissent
Lucci, John Paul, ‘Enron-The Bankruptcy heard around the World and the International Ricochet of Sarbanes-Oxley’ (2003) 67 Albany Law Review
Ridgeway, Jame, ‘Enron finds Shelter’ (2002) 47(4) The Village Voice
Sharman, J.C, ‘South Pacific Tax Havens: From Leaders in the Race to the Bottom to Laggards in the Race to the Top?’ (2005) 29(3) Accounting Forum
Sikka, Prem & Hampton, Mark P, ‘The Role of Accountancy Firms in Tax Avoidance: Some Evidence and Issues’ (2005) 29 Accounting Forum
Stiglitz, Joseph E, ‘The Anatomy of a Murder: Who killed America’s Economy?’ in J Friedman (ed.) What caused the Financial Crisis (2011 University of Pennsylvania Press)
On the surface, the motives behind decisions and events leading to Enron’s downfall appear simple enough: individual and collective greed born in an atmosphere of market euphoria and corporate arrogance. Hardly anyone—the company, its employees, analysts or individual investors—wanted to believe the company was too good to be true. So, for a while, hardly anyone did. Many kept on buying the stock, the corporate mantra and the dream. In the meantime, the company made many high-risk deals, some of which were outside the company’s typical asset risk control process. Many went sour in the early months of 2001 as Enron’s stock price and debt rating imploded because of loss of investor and creditor trust. Methods the company used to disclose its complicated financial dealings were all wrong and downright deceptive. The company’s lack of accuracy in reporting its financial affairs, followed by financial restatements disclosing billions of dollars of omitted liabilities and losses, contributed to its downfall. The whole affair happened under the watchful eye of Arthur Andersen LLP, which kept a whole floor of auditors assigned at Enron year-round.
The financial crisis of 2007–2008 is considered by many economists the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression of the 1930s. This crisis resulted in the threat of total collapse of large financial institutions, the bailout of banks by national governments, and downturns in stock markets around the world. The crisis led to a series of events including: the 2008–2012 global recessions and the European sovereign-debt crisis. The reasons of this financial crisis are argued by economists. The performance of the Federal Reserve becomes a focal point in this argument.
Palley, T. I. (2012). From financial crisis to stagnation: the destruction of shared prosperity and
In the midst of the current economic downturn, dubbed the “Great Recession”, it is natural to look for one, singular entity or person to blame. Managers of large banks, professional investors and federal regulators have all been named as potential creators of the recession, with varying degrees of guilt. No matter who is to blame, the fallout from the mistakes that were made that led to the current crisis is clear. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the current unemployment rate is 9.7%, with 9.3 million Americans out of work (Bureau of Labor Statistics). Compared to a normal economic rate of two or three percent, it is clear that the decisions of one group of people have had a profound affect on the lives of millions of Americans. The real blame for this crisis rests on the heads of the managers that attempted to play the financial system through securitization, and forced the American government to “bail out” their companies with taxpayer money. These managers, specifically the managers of AIG and Citigroup, should be subject to extreme pay caps for the length of time that the American taxpayer holds majority holdings in their companies, as a punitive punishment for causing the Great Recession.
The Stock Market Crash marked a major turning point in the history of the United States. For decades the U.S. was the world’s leading superpower, but after the crash the country cascaded into the worlds most harsh depression. This crash was caused by a series of problems in the U.S. including, the over production of goods, unequal distribution of wealth and poor regulation of the stock market itself. Many can argue that the crash of 1929, strengthened the nation, allowing for policies such as roosevelt's first new deal, second new deal, the glass steagall banking act, and new regulations in the stock market, and for big business (Blumenthal, Karen). However, what can’t be argued is how the crash sparked a panic as companies, peoples, and the nation sank into the great depression.
Enron was the world 's biggest and richest company in the late nineteen-nineties. It 's net value reached 70 billion dollars over the course of a decade and crashed and burned in a single year of savage media coverage and brutal criminal investigations. It 's important to understand how individual arrogance, the corporate recklessness, and U.S. greed collaboratively cost the biggest economic scandal of its kind. Enron was founded in nineteen eighty-five by Kenneth Lay as a natural gas company in the Pacific Northwest. Around that time the energy markets of the US were being deregulated, that is transitioning from government control to free-market. Lay hired visionary Jeffrey Skilling. Under his leadership, the company moved to Houston, Texas
Cabral, R. (2013). A perspective on the symptoms and causes of the financial crisis. Journal of Banking & Finance, 37, 103-117
Investors and the media once considered Enron to be the company of the future. The company had detailed code of ethics and powerful front men like Kenneth Lay, who is the son of a Baptist minister and whose own son was studying to enter the ministry (Flynt 1). Unfortunately the Enron board waived the company’s own ethic code requirements to allow the company’s Chief Financial Officer to serve as a general partner for the partnership that Enron was using as a conduit for much of its business. They also allowed discrepancies of millions of dollars. It was not until whistleblower Sherron S. Watkins stepped forward that the deceit began to unravel. Enron finally declared bankruptcy on December 2, 2001, leaving employees with out jobs or money.
In 2008 the worst financial crisis since the great depression hit and left many people wondering who should be responsible. Many Americans supported the prosecution of Wall Street. To this day there have still not been any arrests of any executive on Wall Street for the financial collapse. Many analysts point out that greed of executives was one of the many factors in the crisis. I will talk about subprime loans, ill-intent, punishments, and white collar crime.
The "subprime crises" was one of the most significant financial events since the Great Depression and definitely left a mark upon the country as we remain upon a steady path towards recovering fully. The financial crisis of 2008, became a defining moment within the infrastructure of the US financial system and its need for restructuring. One of the main moments that alerted the global economy of our declining state was the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers on Sunday, September 14, 2008 and after this the economy began spreading as companies and individuals were struggling to find a way around this crisis. (Murphy, 2008) The US banking sector was first hit with a crisis amongst liquidity and declining world stock markets as well. The subprime mortgage crisis was characterized by a decrease within the housing market due to excessive individuals and corporate debt along with risky lending and borrowing practices. Over time, the market apparently began displaying more weaknesses as the global financial system was being affected. With this being said, this brings into question about who is actually to assume blame for this financial fiasco. It is extremely hard to just assign blame to one individual party as there were many different factors at work here. This paper will analyze how the stakeholders created a financial disaster and did nothing to prevent it as the credit rating agencies created an amount of turmoil due to their unethical decisions and costly mistakes.
If financial markets are instable, it will lead to sharp contraction of economic activity. For example, in this most recent financial crisis, a deterioration in financial institutions’ balance sheets, along with asset price decline and interest rate hikes increased market uncertainty thus, worsening what is called ‘adverse selection and moral hazard’. This is a serious dilemma created before business transactions occur which information is misleading and promotes doing business with the ‘most undesirable’ clients by a financial institution. In turn, these ‘most undesirable’ clients later engage in undesirable behavior. All of this leads to a decline in economic activity, more adverse selection and moral hazards, a banking crisis and further declining in economic activity. Ultimately, the banking crisis came and unanticipated price level increases and even further declines in economic activity.
Enron Corporation was based in Houston, Texas and participated in the wholesale exchange of American energy and commodities (ex. electricity and natural gas). Enron found itself in the middle of a very public accounting fraud scandal in the early 2000s. The corruption of Enron’s CFO and top executives bring to question their ethics and ethical culture of the company. Additionally, examining Enron ethics, their organization culture, will help to determine how their criminal acts could have been prevented.
“When a company called Enron… ascends to the number seven spot on the Fortune 500 and then collapses in weeks into a smoking ruin, its stock worth pennies, its CEO, a confidante of presidents, more or less evaporated, there must be lessons in there somewhere.” - Daniel Henninger.
Enron was on the of the most successful and innovative companies throughout the 1990s. In October of 2001, Enron admitted that its income had been vastly overstated; and its equity value was actually a couple of billion dollars less than was stated on its income statement (The Fall of Enron, 2016). Enron was forced to declare bankruptcy on December 2, 2001. The primary reasons behind the scandal at Enron was the negligence of Enron’s auditing group Arthur Andersen who helped the company to continually perpetrate the fraud (The Fall of Enron, 2016). The Enron collapse had a huge effect on present accounting regulations and rules.
Through an organizational culture that focused on financial greed for self, illegal accounting practices, conflicts of interest partnerships, illegal business dealings, fraud, negligence, and massive corruption at all levels, the Enron scandal help to create new laws and regulations with stiff penalties if violated (Ferrell, et al, 2013). The federal government implemented the Sarbanes Oxley Act (SOX) (Ferrell, et al, 2013).