so many ways...beyond the obvious.  My father was a union tool and dye maker, my mother stayed at home, and we had a more than comfortable existence.  Ofcourse, most of those jobs are gone now....and with them, the unions.  What replaced the union influence in these small towns spread across the rustbelt?  The slimy chamber of commerce types.  That, in truth, is what happened to the democratic party after the late seventies and early eighties.  With the republicans, financed and put into office by the moneyed interests, we saw a ever greatening erosion of workers rights.  No one has been looking out for all of those people who get up every day and go to work.

My husband was a union worker.  Then after we bought our first house (in 1981), BANG!  Reagan started busting the unions when he fired all the air traffic controllers.  It has been downhill ever since.  And yes, his union went bust, and his salary cut in half.  

I have never belonged to a union, but have seen it all in my work years.  While working at corporations, unions have tried to come in and the top brass told so many outright LIES about unions!  And dunderheads actually believed them.  I'd look out the window and see unions putting fliers on cars, only to see corporate goons take them all off 30 minutes later.  (And I know what they were doing because I went out and took mine off my car, to see what it was) while they were doing it.

WHEN will Americans start voting their best interests (be it unions, healthcare, on and on) rather than sucking up to Republicans?????

Australia is a strongly unionized country and as a result, a factory wage is still good value. There's an immense difference between the US and Australia on this.

..is honesty. And honesty needs to be enforced - that's what the regulation is for. Investors need to know that when they're paying for something, it is what they think it is. Capitalism in and of itself is a great system, it works very well, but it falls apart when people lie, and the role of government is to make sure they don't do so (I'd put regulating exploitative business practices within the same bracket - they're generally exploitative because the person you're, say, lending to doesn't fully understand the terms and consequences of the agreement, which might as well be lying).
This entire crisis is centered around a question of honesty. Borrowers were lied to (there's plenty of evidence for actual lying), then the institutions that bought the bonded loans were lied to (told the quality of the bonds was higher than it was), those who suspected problems looked the other way (more lying), and the whole thing snowballed. But it all comes down to a lack of truth pervading the whole system. Regulation, meaning measures to prevent exploitative lending and enforcing sensible and honest accounting practices could have prevented this. But Greenspan resisted it (and the ridiculously low interest rates of course didn't help).