Restructure of the Global Economy after the Financial Crises - Essay Example

Kenneth Lay and his team of corrupt executives stole millions of dollars in performance bonuses. He cooked up the books, created fake shell corporations, and misguided the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the general public about the actual state of affairs at Enron. I would ask Kenneth Lay about the start of the pattern of corruption at Enron. Did he ever think that the corruption at his company would get so much out of control? Does he feel any remorse for destroying the value of Enron from $90 a stock to less $1?

The stockholders of Enron lost over $11 billion due to the irresponsible actions of Kenneth Lay and his crew of bandits (Suddath). The second person I started to talk to at the party was Bernard Madoff. Once upon a time Bernard Madoff was in charge of what seemed to be one of the most successful investment funds in the industry. In reality Bernard Madoff was not investing any of the money he was receiving from investors. Bernard Madoff was running a $50 billion ponzi scheme. The revelation is considered one of the biggest financial scandals in the history of Wall Street.

Upon meeting Mr. Madoff I would ask him about his illicit operations. What was different about your ponzi scheme? How were you able to hide the truth from investors from so long? If you had to do it again would you make the same decisions? Bernard Madoff wasted his financial intellect robbing people of their hard earn money. The next two persons I got a chance to talk to during the party were Milton Friedman and Adam Smith. Both these gentlemen have no association to the disgraceful scandals Kenneth Lay and Bernard Madoff were involved with.

Milton Friedman has worked throughout his lifetime as an economist, professor, and author of many books. In 1976 Milton Friedman won the Nobel Prize for economics. In 1962 he wrote the book Capitalism and Freedom. Adam Smith throughout his lifetime was a philosopher and economist. He introduced the topic of self-interest into the business world. “Today Smith’s reputation rests on his explanation of how rational self-interest in a free-market economy leads to economic well being” (Econlib).

I would sit in a round table with both Milton and Adam to discuss the financial crisis of 2008 and ideas on how to improve the global economy today. During the financial crisis of 2008 the global economy hit rock bottom as the world entered into a recession that devastated the standard of living of billions of humans across the world. The banking industry was one of the parties responsible for the crisis due to the fact that they were making housing loans to people that did not qualify. The housing market fell and many Americans were faced with negative equity on their homes.

Bankruptcies skyrocketed during the financial crisis of 2008. I would ask both Adam Smith and Milton Friedman if they thought the crisis could have been prevented. I would take advantage of this opportunity to speak with these two renounced economists to discuss ideas about how to improve the global economy. An idea that I have that is aligned with the self-interest perspective of Adam Smith is imposing a global tax. The global tax would equal 2% of the gross domestic product (GDP) of each nation.

The organization responsible for charging the tax would be the United Nations. The money gathered from this tax would be used to provide economic assistance to the