New York Times- They are not normally a shy group, the hedge fund managers, private equity titans and Wall Street executives whose net worth has suddenly become a national issue. But last spring, when a group of them gathered at the Regency in New York for a Democratic fund-raiser, they were downright bashful.
After dinner and comments from several senators, Charles E. Schumer, Democrat of New York, opened it up for questions. When no one brought up taxation, the issue about which everyone wanted to know, Mr. Schumer asked his colleague, Max Baucus of Montana, the ranking member of the Senate Finance Committee, to explain what he thought about raising taxes on the people running private equity firms and hedge funds.
Mr. Baucus’s response, according to people in attendance, was that the Senate was a long way from doing anything. The issue, he made clear, required a lot of analysis. “He was calming,†one attendee said.
