it's not as simple as taking gambits and winning vs. losing, the deck is stacked in one direction. If it's a free market, much as I may not like it, you can sell snake oil to idiots and that's ok, legally (if not ethically). Claiming they cure cancer and encouraging people to buy it (to the exclusion of actual cancer treatment) is a completely different matter, and sooner or later that will come back to bite a lot of people in the ass. How is that latter hypothetical any different than offering ninj/a mortgages? It's not a gamble, it's a time bomb, a game of hot potato and the only people who lose are the masses who can't pass it on to the next guy because they aren't actually involved in the game.

I agree about the preschool thing completely, my point was that you don't see anything close to a short term return and I see no inclination in the government to make a 20yr investment with impossible to measure profits.