Should Bernie Madoff's investors be bailed out? Should you reimburse them?

Well, these people mostly wanted to be rich bad enough that all the crook had to do was say I was wrong, misguided, and misinformed. They were eager to believe him and disount me. When I called our State's Attorney General's office they were eager for the info and did issue a warrant after an investigation. Unfortunately, the last I heard the crook in our story left the country with a few million and had not been caught that I have heard.

Wow! I would have liked to have been in that room with ya', Red! Rarely do we have a prescient moment before we leap off the bridge of faith, and dive into stupidity. You gave those folks that rare gift. And, I'll bet that all you got in returen were a bunch of snide looks and hisses, huh?

They were eager to believe him and discount me. Kinda reminds me of a certain recent election....

Hello Peavey, I'm disgusted as well. There is no way for the funds to be returned. Madoff's Ponzi Scheme worked exactly as the US Government's Social Security Ponzi Scheme works. The shell game is to take money from Peter to pay Paul. All the while hoping and praying that enough Peters will keep lining up to cough up the dough needed to keep paying the growing number of Pauls.

Not hard at all, my friend. Unless of course we live in an entitlement reality where people actually believe that they should never have to suffer the consequences of their own choices. Criminies, my husband and I have lost a significant portion of our retirement accounts. But, we're not asking for the taxpayer to make it right for us. And, neither are the rest of those Americans who've lost their shirts. If the known risks of investing in the market were too high for the 'Madoff victims', then they ought to have put their funds in Certificates of Deposits, or Municipal Bonds.

"Start a trend like this and we'll be bailing out anyone who tanked in the stock market." Exactly! The current projections are that approximately 40% of American adults have lost between 30% - 50% of their stock, bond, and mutual fund assets. Why are "Madoff victims" any different than any other investor who accepted the known risks as outlined in every prospectus? The only reason is because they can put a face to thief who robbed them blind. Everybody else has to just take their lumps and move on -- they don't even know who to direct their anger toward.

Welcome to MyLot MSwengel. I hope that you thoroughly enjoy our little community. I'd like to thank you for seemingly 'getting it'. And, if it's alright with you, I'd like to use your terrific 'take' on this issue as a launghing pad to make another point. Would that alright? These people aren't stupid, and they're not deserving of scourn because they HAD money to lose (that's called class envy). They took risks. The same risk that every investor (whether its the stock market, real estate market, commodities market, tangibles market) takes when they gamble. And hey, let's face it that what it really was/is -- a gamble. Every investment vehicle warns of the inherent risks. That written explanation of the investment specifics and warnings is called a prosectus. Some of the Madoff investors actually did do their due diligence -- they made investigatory calls to the SEC to see if any charges had been alleged against him, and he got a clean bill, similar to the kind of answer one would get if they asked the Better Business Bureau if any charges had been levied against 123ABC Corp. (example). Thus far, every respondent to this thread agrees that the Madoff investors shouldn't be 'bailed out'. I'm expounding here because I believe that if we're ever going to be able to grow from this experience, as a people, as a nation, then we need to understand the reasons why it is unacceptable to bail out "the few" just because they've been given national air time to plead their case. If the initial risk is evenly shared, and the dividend is proportionally distributed, then so too should the losses be proportionally realized. As to return to your fine point, Mswengel -- we simply can't bail out every one who has ever been taken for a ride. Nor should we. We cannot grow and actualize as Human Beings if we are always protected from the pain of our mistakes! While I agree that it stinks, our greatest learning opportunities are quite often our biggest mistakes.

I'm sick of it too, Heather. Thanks for sharing!

Great points, Deejean. Thank you! While this is certainly sad, and has a terribly rippling effect on the economy as a whole, the fact remains that these investors are way out of line in thinking that they were uniquely free of responsibility when the handed over their money to Madoff and his lead-in hedgefund. Talk about carrying the "entitlement mentality" to the extreme.