I don't know about you but the push to over-regulate Wall Street concerns me. It just feels like a simplistic knee-jerk reaction to the economic crisis that our country is experiencing. For me, I would probably go with clarifying the laws already on the books or doing nothing more.
I do not embrace a lot of the 'Obama is a socialist" squawk radio rhetoric that is floating around these days but do feel that we already have too much government and could do more with less.
One interesting note in this time of large unemployment is the idea of governmnet workers always seem to keep their jobs.. at the federal level anyway. Maybe we need to consolidate voting districts and layoff a few members of congress :)
How would you have voted on the poll question?
Hello Kansas Bob,
ReplyDeleteI agree, it probably is a knee-jerk reaction. Personally, I think mainstream banks were already appropriately regulated.
The problem was that there emerged a shadow banking industry. Companies started behaving like banks - offering long-term lending on short-term deposits, but were not considered true banks by the government. Thus they were permitted to operate as unregulated banks.
They proved to be so successful in the short term without the burden of regulation that they grew larger than true banks. Unfortunately, when the crash came, they didn't have the reserves that regular banks are required by regulatory law to cover their losses.
Having both borrowed from traditional banks and sold securities backed by their assets to these banks, their losses quickly spread.
We should expand existing bank regulations to all institutions that behave like a bank regardless of what they call themselves or how they take deposits and invest.
Those are some of my opinions, anyway.
"Maybe we need to consolidate voting districts and layoff a few members of congress :)"
ReplyDeleteThat smiley face won't keep you off 'the list' for making such a statement. Be afraid ... be very afraid!
THIS IS INCREDIBLE!!!! I AM JEALOUS. Gary never did a banner for me :(
ReplyDeleteSeriously, its incredible. He's very talented.