This one from Keynes: “It is necessarily part of the business of a banker to maintain appearances, and to profess a conventional respectability, which is more than human. Life-long practices of this kind make them the most romantic and the least realistic of men. It is so much their stock-in-trade that their position should not be
questioned, that they do not even question it themselves until it is
too late. Like the honest citizens they are, they feel a proper
indignation at the perils of the wicked world in which they live, —
when the perils mature; but they do not foresee them.” From Essays in Persuasion 1931
The Enlightened Economist
Economics and business books
How about Thomas Jefferson?
“And I sincerely believe, with you, that banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies and that the principle of spending money to be paid by posterity, under the name of funding, is but swindling futurity on a large scale.”
“The issue which has swept down the centuries and which will have to be fought sooner or later is the people versus the banks.”
Lord Acton (1834-1902)
Of course, armies gave birth to banking establishments – it was having to raise money to fight wars that created finance in the first place. Still, you look at the figures now – tens of billions here, hundreds there – and shudder at the burden we're laying on future generations. Given the demographic trends, I predict the future generations will decline, and we can either work until we drop or repudiate our debts of bibilcal proportions. I use 'our' loosely to mean our generation, but blame the bankers of course.