In the song “I’m Sorry,” John Denver sings the lyrics of one part which says, “I’m sorry for the way things are in China.” The song continues and a later line is, “but most of all I’m sorry for myself.” To paraphrase the song, I, too, am sorry for the way things are in China, and also for the way things are in Common Market countries, but most of all I’m sorry for the way things are in America.

There are problems developing in the economy for the Chinese because they too have tried to stimulate their growth by government intervention.

Numerous nations in Europe have allowed political influences to provide artificial and excessive lifestyles to large segments of their population by borrowing from other stronger-willed countries and now the day of reckoning is upon them.

We are not far behind, and some well known economists say we are even ahead of those nations on the road to crisis.

Union settlements for benefits have provided for long-term commitmentsthat are now beyond the scope of the government in more than one European nation and we have seen the strikes and rioting on our television newscasts.

Some nations have worked through this situation in a peaceful manner, others have led to violence, looting and the jailing of many.

The reaction of the nation’s population comes from years of excesses, but the fact is the roots are most frequently an immediate threat of loss of some benefit, wages, health care, jobs, etc. Which was accumulated in “good times” without consideration of its impact when times are bad.

We saw the same thing occur in Madison, Wisc., when the teachers union fought with the governor for control of their negotiating rights. Years of benefits growth had threatened the state’s solvency. For the most part the picketing waspeaceful, but not without the bitterness and frustration that follows when situations like this occur.

I remember violent union activity in the coal mines when John L. Lewis was representing the coal miners, and I also remember the automotive industry’s history of union contract negotiations and the violence of those events.

Today we have a reaction taking place against the (United States) financial community in something that started out peacefully to “occupy Wall Street.” There is no question there are excesses in the banking community and the investing activities of some of our leading financial communities. The Bernie Madoffs and Raj Rajaratnams may be in jail but the rewards of their cheating investors probably outweighs the punishment even in theireyes. I wonder, however, if the leaders of this protest actually expect to change the financial marketplace.

There are ties between our government leaders, unions, various types of corporations and the banking community which we overlook unless we delve deeply into the whole activity.

I am no authority on the banking community, nor do I pretend to understand all the quarterly corporate reports that come out from companies listed on the stock exchanges. However, you can find out a great deal about the power exerted on corporations (and banks are corporations) just by looking at the ownership of the corporations’ stock. If you go to Yahoo’s financial page and look up companies in the 30 stocks listed in the Dow Jones Average, some names keep popping up over and over. One need not be a rocket scientist to make a list of the top five or 10 institutional investors in these companies to realize that there are some questions that come to mind when you summarize the information and the actualownership of the stock.

If we have a retirement plan at work, which invests our funds into a mutual fund, the money must be invested somewhere. Some can go to bonds, some to stocks, etc., but most of thisis through a mutual fund which makes its money by investing in places where the return is greatest.

Union dues go into investments also and the investments generally cover a number of areas such as bonds, stocks, mutual funds - and the list goes on. But, the control of the money we have in these “savings accounts” are not in our hands but in the hands of those who are the administrators of the retirement funds who decide where to invest it.

Maybe I’m missing something, but it appears to me that taking one’s savings (if they have any left) and buying gold or silver and putting it in a safe place would hurt the financiers on Wall Street a lot worse than picketing or demonstrating. Because each of us are “little investors,” we alone have little or noimpact on Wall Street or on a corporation listed on the NYSE, NASDAQ , etc. As an example, consider the billions of dollars of stock outstanding in a company like General Electric where over half of the outstandingshares (52 percent) are held by 1610 institutions. The largest holder (as of June 30, 2011) is The Vanguard Group, Inc. with $7.5 billion worth - over 400 million shares or 3.78 percent of the total outstanding shares.

The Vanguard Total Stock Market Index Fund reports 119 million shares of G.E. stock in its portfolio. Is it any wonder Washington politicians listen when the financial community asks for a favor or offers a political contribution? These institutions and mutual funds deal with hundreds of thousands of shares on a daily basis and it is the money from various sources like cities’ pension funds, union funds, etc., which provide for their power. How can a few hundred picketers stop the economy based on the assets of the very people carrying the signs?

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Editor’s note: Leo Lynch, a native of Benton County has deep roots in northwest Arkansas. He is a retired industrial engineer and former Justice of the Peace. He can be contacted at prtnews@ nwaonline.com.

Opinion, Pages 4 on 10/26/2011