Lawmakers should be banned from trading individual stocks since, lawmakers, by definition, create legislation. The price of a stock of a company very heavily depends on the performance and the ability of that company to predictably generate profit. With regards to this, the behavior of markets is greatly tied to the set of rules and regulations they are bound to abide. Lawmakers can use their ability to create legislation to create favorable or unfavorable conditions of a market sector linked to the company of which they own a stock, thus allowing it to manipulate it's price for personal economic gain. This also leads to the line of thought that lawmakers will be incentivized due to the personal economic gain earlier talked about, to influence policy as a whole. This may in turn result in policy diverging from what is best for public interests. While it is true that lawmakers are independent people and have should have the autonomy to make personal financial investments, since they are on a higher ground than a common civilian in terms of information access and proposed economic influence, and since stock market investments influence the very nature of their job as lawmakers to move towards good civic governance, they should not be allowed to invest in individual stocks.

Taking the example of a city council member investing a "small" amount in a "local bank" is a gross underestimation of the adversity of market manipulation. Since the council member is a public servant, in the eyes of government, and with regards to governance, he/she must not be equated with the common citizen. Since the opposition calls for the example of a very localized governance body, the lawmaker I argue, can influence more directly the localized market sector for stock manipulation, as localized systems are small in scale, and are more directly affected due to grassroots legislature, one can use one's legislation creation ability as a trump card. Also, I have highlighted the massive scale at which manipulation can occur, if lawmakers are at national and international governing bodies. To this, the opposition has given no answer, but only responded with what ifs. To quote the opposition, "I get the worry, but this seems like a lot" is an ambiguous and arbitrary counter.

Yet again, the opposition has no argument. Yes, legislators and lawmakers can disclose more of their investments, but that will only further embolden and legitimize market manipulation, even if they can get called out for it later.