Imagine you are ill. A health rating agency, let us call it Moody & Poor, publishes your rating. Somebody bets on your death. Others withdraw life support; what might have been a self-denying becomes a self-fulfilling, demoralizing, prophecy. The betting company cashes in “some serious money”–the expression used in Goldman Sachs when they celebrated the fall of the US housing market (Washington Post 24 April 2010). Remedy: outlaw most, make credit rating–teleconferences by 5 voting experts–transparent. They are paid by the people who issue the debts to be rated.