Wall Street Confesses to Bonus Culture’s Ills: William D. Cohan - Bloomberg: What is painfully clear from Ressler and Mitchell’s transcripts is that the incentive system on Wall Street that rewards bankers and traders for the revenue they generate by constantly selling whatever comes across their desks, regardless of its quality, is terribly, terribly broken. People are simple: They do what they are rewarded to do, and they will continue to do that over and over again until they are rewarded to do something else.
Now, four years after the crisis started -- and despite the Dodd-Frank law intended to reduce the risks on Wall Street -- not one thing has changed in what bankers and traders are rewarded to do. Until that happens, you can forget about preventing another crisis on Wall Street.