[PEN-L:3820] Re: stock market & investment

[DYMSKI@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx]

Just a quick addition to a thread that even the ubiquitous Mr. Henwood
must by now admit to be less than anemic.  Doug's points about my
post are well taken.  The work that many people in the PK/RPE crowd have
done on redlining, access to credit for women and minority-owned firms,
etc., is on point here.    I would simply add this about the problem
of connecting all this to the stock-market game.  That is, that portion
of firms [and households, in the sense of those whose ratios don't
qualify them for loans that can be securitized] for which financial
structure _really_ binds and limits options -- the smaller firms,
lower-income and minority households, women-owned firms, etc. -- this
portion of firms is largely cut off from access TO the big board, or
even its evil twin, the NASDAQ.

[Sorry for the redundancy in that sentence, I was becoming as effusive
as Barkley for a moment until I caught myself.]

So the sturm-und-drang of up and down in the DJIA etc. affects the "big
players" while those with ever--narrowing access to mainstream financial
markets are squeezed _independent_ of this movement.

Keynes is not so good at distinguishing "classes" of borrowers in the
credit market; the kind of shifts in intermediation practices that
have occurred since he wrote would probably justify another chapter now.

Gary Dymski