The recent collapse of Bear Stearns, and all of the pain and anguish that has accompanied it, mainly by the employees and retirees should heighten the call for a review of the line between greed and good business practices’¦and ‘˜ethical’ behavior. The shareholders took this one on the chin both the institutional, and the widow Masterson. I feel terrible for this poor woman who was living off of the dividends, and am just a little more than a tad angry at the institutional investor.

Between the board of directors, and the institutional investors, there is one word which explains this whole debacle perfectly – ‘œgreed’.

Financial Services and Wall Street can be a wonderful place to work; to earn a respectable living, even by most standards, an incredible living. But like speed – ‘œgreed’ kills too.

As the regulators, members of congress, market participants, boards of directors, and institutional shareholders all gather round the table of feigned or real remorse, a heaping dish of humble pie MUST be served up for all to eat. And then there ought to be a large pitcher of Kool-Aid ‘” enough for everyone at the table.

In real terms what’s desperatly needed is something very much like the ‘˜speed trap’. But that suggests a speed limit doesn’t it?

The market needs a speed limit (margin limits to be raised) and ‘˜greed trap’ – and regulators armed with a technology gun, and a set of stiff handcuffs, should any Wall Street big shot think that he can greed anytime he or she wants to.

Heck the demise of the trading floor of the NYSE was because the world wanted to buy and sell stocks in ‘œmilliseconds’ instead of minutes.

The desire to ‘˜go fast’ trumped the desire to get the best price which means going slow sometimes.

The need for speed, and the ugly and base human emotion of wanting more and more right now, is what has caused Bear Stearns to collapse, the sub prime mess, and most other current economic problems.

At the risk of sounding like a spiritualist’¦ the main ingredient to a permanent fix of these kinds of problems, is to realize that happiness and fulfillment in life, real success, is not measured by the size of ones bank balance, but by the size of ones heart, and what one does with the blessings that have been given – yes ‘˜given’ to them.

Every time I meet a guy from Wall Street who was born on 3rd base and thinks he hit a triple’¦ I smile and say to myself’¦ its just a matter of time before he gets thrown out of the game!

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Walter Schubert, a third generation member of the New York Stock Exchange is the Founder and CEO of GFN.com: The Gay Financial Network.