The Misunderstood Dynamic Of Wall Street - Psychopath Central

Most people think of psychopaths as serial killers or other very violent personality types. Not necessarily so. As a friend and I were discussing yesterday, there is a spectrum of psychopathic tendencies. It is not typical that someone can check a box to determine a personality disorder. There may be psychopaths who are one step away from being a serial killer and there may be people whose tendencies are manifested in less violent but equally deviant behavior. I would argue the latter is an even greater threat to society as we will discuss below.

We have talked on here before that it is pretty well understood that people with psychopathic tendencies or psychopaths themselves make the best traders. Obviously when trading millions to billions of dollars of oil or stocks or bonds, emotions are very counterproductive. Yet, we as humans are hard wired with a fear response when presented with certain situations. Losing money is one of them, which is why trading firms often have psychiatrists or psychologists on staff.

Psychopaths are driven by what society would classify as deviant behavior. I would argue that drive is part of an unconscious desire to seek an altered state of consciousness through externalities. As the author notes, that includes money, sex and status. Is it really any surprise that we see all of these things as primary drivers of behavior on Wall Street. And the behavior has reached such a level of excess that it often seems as though it is at a level of addiction or outright fraud? Yet we see our economic model determined by these personality types. ie, The hyper-competitive 'at-any-cost' race to the bottom of the barrel which glorifies excessive and often destructive behavior and social dynamics. Where did this dynamic develop? Wall Street owns the microphone to society. Wall Street has influenced our economic model more than any other source. That includes even our educational system. Even our value system. The great Buddha would find no audience seeking enlightenment on Wall Street. And neither would most Americans find much of anything in common with these personality types.

Have you ever wondered why the Wall Street CEOs and executives who blew up the world seemingly have no remorse? Will take no responsibility? Continue to pay themselves billions using taxpayer money? See absolutely nothing wrong with their behavior or the behavior they encourage? Have you ever wondered why many business CEOs have no problem paying themselves hundreds of millions in retirement packages while looting the employee pension plans or firing tens of thousands of employees to meet personal bonus objectives? Or of cutting health care benefits systematically over the last generation? Or health insurance executives willing to pay themselves tens of millions of dollars for cancelling insurance policies of terminally-ill policyholders via some loophole? Are these people psychopaths? Do they have well-developed psychopathic tendencies?

These people represent the very worst of the human condition. Many of these executives show no outward signs of empathy, compassion or concern for society or our planet. Instead they are very me-centric confirming extremely out of control egos or manufactured self-image. Seeking success is healthy and natural. But what do we define as healthy and natural? Previous studies have shown many high achievers in business are indeed psychopaths. Remember as we have written ad nauseam, the personality profile of those seeking power and control should never be trusted. There really is no such thing as the benevolent dictator. Or, if there is, it is a one in a million type of dynamic driven by enlightened leaders seeking truth over personal gain.

So, where might we seek to spot psychopaths given their profile? Politicians? Lobbyists? Wall Street? CEOs? Obviously I am not stating that everyone who seeks success is a psychopath. That would be an absurd interpretation of my remarks but I can assure you this dynamic is much more common than is recognized by society.

This is why We the People shouldn't be turning our fate over to a handful of power-seeking personalities. Or let politicians make our economic and political decisions without the involvement of society. aka No transparency and seamy back room deals with lobbyists. Government should educate and encourage its citizens to actively participate in the role of self-governance.

Link here.