We might be tempted to put a stop to "speculation" as several bills in the congress are promising to do. I doubt if any of them will have the intended consequences. For starters, speculative capital is mobile. If people can't speculate in Chicago or New York, they will do so in London or Dubai. The real losers will be pension funds who don't have the luxury of leaving this country. They will struggle to meet future obligations as the best asset class in an inflationary world becomes unavailable to them. They will have to be bailed out by taxpayers. Therefore, while the politicians are still at it, they might also want to read my following post.....cleverly plagiarized from somebody smart