The Cult of Finance

Umair Haque makes the case that finance is a cult (via the Big Picture):

In the last post, I suggested that modern-day "finance" as we know it has little to nothing to do with (real) economics. Where economics is about creating authentic value, igniting positive sum games, discovering pathways to prosperity, finance is (or has become) about reshuffling yesterday's value, extracting the lion's share in zero sum games.

Yet, the self-appointed sheriff of the global economy--the master "trader"; in reality, a mere jumpsuited technician of a lethally dysfunctional machine--is viewed as the modern-day equivalent of a mystical seer, a Delphic oracle, whose visions earn the indisputable right to luxuries and riches beyond the most avaricious dreams of the kings of yore.

All of which raises the question: if modern-day finance isn't (about) economics, then what is it? I'd like to suggest it's nothing more than--and nothing less than--a cult.

He makes a pretty good case, and listening to some Tea Partiers talking about the efficiency of the markets (among other topics) reminds one of a person who is willing to drink the Kool-aid if told to.  The bosses on Wall Street should have been brought down off of their pedestals after driving the global economy in the ditch, but they've been bailed out, and still don't have the decency to pick up some humility along the way.  The fact that so many people who have very little are willing to carry their water for them blows me away.