let’s not sit around and give each other hand jobs

That’s something David Foster Wallace used to say in workshop, if everyone was being too nice about someone’s work.  It’s also a pretty good description of what happened in the world of investment banking over the past few years. The mortgage-bundlers and the bankers were sitting around, giving each other hand jobs back and forth. And then the mortgage-bundlers were like, “Look, we’re going to get a hand job later, from the homeowner. Do you think you could spot us a hand job now?” And the banks were like, “Sure, yeah. You’ve always been good about giving us hand jobs back.” Which, though, when you think about it, at some level, the *banks just really liked giving out hand jobs*. And then the day came when the hand jobs stopped.

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