The nanny-state mentality of the Bush Administration and its appointees shows no sign of abating. The latest farce comes from the Securities and Exchange Commission, which want to prohibit all but the very wealthy from taking advantage of successful hedge fund investing. Richard Rahn comments in the Washington Times:
Financial regulation is most often justified by arguing it is needed to protect all participants from those who would engage in fraud or theft, and to protect unsophisticated investors from losing money in investments they do not understand. The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has just proposed that the amount of liquid net worth an individual must have before investing in hedge funds and other so-called risky investments be raised to as much as $2.5 million. People meeting a net liquid worth requirement are considered “accredited investors.” …Even though most people would agree it is important to try to protect “widows and orphans” from unscrupulous and/or incompetent financial promoters, there is a fine line between protecting those who need protection and denying freedom to those who don’t. Does it make sense to prohibit a person who has recently obtained a graduate degree in finance from a leading business school from buying and selling hedge funds, because he or she has not yet accumulated some arbitrary amount of wealth — while legally allowing any adult man or woman to take all of his or her wealth and go to Las Vegas and blow it at the gambling tables?
