Why Is Wall Street Different?
The “World’s Work” asks a very important question, and echoes many minds in doing it, that if Mr. Wilson, however wise or otherwise his words may have been, when he spoke of Wall Street and its work, should cause stocks to fall, what does it mean? It remarks that a man,—even the president of the United States—might talk ever so much and even ever so foolishly about the book market, or shoe market, or lumber market, or clothing market; and yet the bookmen and the shoe men and the lumbermen would not become frightened and sell their property; nor would they “answer back” by “throwing a fit.” What is there in the stock-and-bond market that makes it different from other markets? Why must these men be so delicately dealt with, or always left alone? Is their business in some way sacred? Does its success depend on silence? If the many interests of the country were on a square, honest basis, would any speech or any number of speeches be likely to affect them?