Jon Stewart Asks: Is Congressional Insider Trading Unethical If It's Legal?

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
Dino Grandoni 4,032 Views Feb 16, 2012

On The Daily Show last night, Jon Stewart made easy work of a little loophole in insider-trading law for the folks who represent us in Congress. When civilians buy or sell securities on non-public knowledge, they get jail time. When a senator or representative does it? Apparently there's nothing the law can do. "It's our system of checks and balances. They deposit their checks, it increases their balances," Stewart said. And as he pointed out, even the legislation Congress begrudgingly passed to restrict its members for insider deals has no teeth.

 

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