I think that, in terms of social value, the point of diminishing returns for market making and liquidity has long since passed, especially wrt social value for Avg. Joes & Janes.
I def. don't hold Facebook etc in a much higher regard here, but if we're talking about brain drain from socially useful fields, I don't think anyone can credibly argue that finance (esp. HFT et al) provides any meaningful social value.
In fact I'll go one further: by sucking up the best and brightest, high finance is doing a net harm to more socially useful sectors.
I'm not being prescriptive wrt what choices people should make, btw, just speaking in terms of social good.
I def. don't hold Facebook etc in a much higher regard here, but if we're talking about brain drain from socially useful fields, I don't think anyone can credibly argue that finance (esp. HFT et al) provides any meaningful social value.
In fact I'll go one further: by sucking up the best and brightest, high finance is doing a net harm to more socially useful sectors.
I'm not being prescriptive wrt what choices people should make, btw, just speaking in terms of social good.