Top Goldman Executive Director quits: "It makes me ill how callously people talk about ripping their clients off"

if a top goldman exec quitting and splashing it all over an nyt op-ed doesn't cause a tsunami, it should...

When the history books are written about Goldman Sachs, they may reflect that the current chief executive officer, Lloyd C. Blankfein, and the president, Gary D. Cohn, lost hold of the firm’s culture on their watch. I truly believe that this decline in the firm’s moral fiber represents the single most serious threat to its long-run survival.

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It makes me ill how callously people talk about ripping their clients off. Over the last 12 months I have seen five different managing directors refer to their own clients as “muppets,” sometimes over internal e-mail. Even after the S.E.C., Fabulous Fab, Abacus, God’s work, Carl Levin, Vampire Squids? No humility? I mean, come on. Integrity? It is eroding. I don’t know of any illegal behavior, but will people push the envelope and pitch lucrative and complicated products to clients even if they are not the simplest investments or the ones most directly aligned with the client’s goals? Absolutely. Every day, in fact.

even though smith doesn't touch on the damage goldman and its ilk have created in the larger world, even a focus on the greed relationship goldman has created with its clients is something coming from an insider... it's good to have perceptions validated...

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