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I heard on another program - PBS Newshour - that wall street was able to convince the government to change accounting rules that gave the banks better balance sheets and allowed them to appear more profitable. Is this a factor and if so are these real profits or just a result of weaker accounting?

Why don't we just tax the hell out of Wall Street?
Businesses and bonuses!

Nice faux Populous rage. Now what are you going to do Comptroller DiNapoli to diversify the state’s economy, make upstate start carrying its own weight when it comes to generating taxes for New York , and make it so we don’t need Wall Street to pay for all of the legislature’s pet projects and waste.
You can’t have your cake and eat it too so tell us what you will cut from the budget so we aren’t relying on Wall Street and I’ll believe you’re serious about being anti-bonus. (I know you can’t, so don’t waste your time.)
By the way, what did Wall Street do to help NY state pay all of the pension dollars it’s been promising? How do you plan on meeting pension commitments without investing in the great beast you’re pretending to be against. You didn't complain when you were making tax money hand over fist... you should have saved.

how smart is it for the comptroller's office to announce that it will be selling certain investment assets on the market - as one of its office staff did in the new york post?

If there are fewer jobs on Wall St, doesn't that mean that the operating costs of existing firms are lowered, therefore, contributing to the higher profits?

How do the changes to banking accounting effect the reported profits of the street firms? They no longer have to mark to market their bad assets.

I'm confused. How can it be a record if Wall Street bonuses are $20.3 billion this year (2009) if it was $32.9 billion in 2007?

It is much easier for the firms to make money when the Fed funds rate is 0%.

I understand that a small number of firms on 'the street,' and in particular Goldman Sachs, are authorized to broker U.S. debt- so the massive amount of money the country has borrowed recently has added up to tremendous fees and profits for Goldman, et al. Is this correct?

I'm confused. A "bitter" pill for New Yorkers? Is not Wall Street the entire tax base for Albany and the State of New York?

If the government loaned me millions at zero percent interest, I could also make excellent profits. Where can I sign up?

Thank god we saved our fianancial engineers....

We could do nothiing with out them...