I will never get over the chipper tone used in economics podcasts when describing the scams that underpin our financial ecosystem. This is a low-tech example, of how a company lied about its user base to get acquired by JPMorgan... which just wanted fresh sales leads.
Our financial system truly is predicated on a reckless set of confidence games wrapped up in technical smokescreens & slick lingo.
...Can we please start building hyperregional democratic systems instead?
@MLClark I found the podcast hilarious. Having done a brief stint with Big Banking, I can say nothing in it surprised me, either from the startup or JPM.
I bet some sensible soul pointed out early on that only 18M FAFSAs are completed annually, so slim chance a startup had captured that much market without a higher ed sponsor. Then they were drowned by the naked greed of a bunch of overpaid suits, self selected for avarice.
So, no actual people were harmed in this amusing tale of karma. 😂