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WarrenThe ratings agencies have had, and still have, under current conditions, an incredibly wonderful business. I mean, it takes no capital at all. You know, the pricing power is significant. And certain parts of the world feel they need rating agencies. There are also a certain part of the world is very mad at rating agencies, and many feel that the rating agencies let them down. when the rating agencies essentially succumbed to the same mania, in effect, you can say, that prevailed throughout the investment world and really the political world and the media world and all, et cetera. They made the same mistake that, as again, politicians made, I made, you know, you made, mortgage brokers made, whomever. They couldn't see a world where residential housing, countrywide, would collapse. And I don't think that was done because they were the incentive part of it. There may have been some small aspect that that played. I just think that, you know, it's very hard to think contrary to the crowd. And on the other hand, there is a, obviously, a backlash against rating agencies. There may be legal. remedies. You can get views on that either way. If they are not forced to change, the whole structure around them does not change in some dramatic way, it's a pretty, it's a pretty darn good business in that you can't shop pricing in the radiating agency business. That we have never paid any attention to rig. for bonds. I mean, you know, at Berkshire. We don't think we should farm out, outsource investment judgment. If we can't do it ourselves, we don't, we just don't do it. And we're not going to rely on somebody else's opinion, whether it's a rating agency or an investment advisory organization or a management consulting firm or anybody else.
CharlieWell, I would argue that the rating agencies in their present form and structured with their present incentives have been a wonderfully constructive involvement. in our country for a great many decades. And what happened, of course, is that the cognition faltered. They drifted with the stupidity of their times in a way that was regrettable. Part of it came out of as an entity in American business education. They overbelieved in these ridiculous models and so on and so on and so on. And I've yet to hear a single apology. There's a single apology from business academia for its huge contribution to our present difficulties.