Here's my latest in the Pierre Capital Journal. A snippet:
If we don’t like bailing out banks, then we can’t let banks get so large. Presently, five banks hold “assets equal to 56 percent of the country’s economy” according to David Rohde. One way to reduce the risk to the public is to separate commercial and investment banking.
Some, including Sen. Johnson, believe that the Dodd-Frank banking reform bill passed in 2009 is enough regulation. This complicated morass of regulatory confusion accomplishes precisely what it was intended to do. Sponsored by two members of Congress, Chris Dodd and Barney Frank, deeply involved in banking corruption, Dodd-Frank favors big banks at the expense of smaller banks who find compliance with byzantine rules difficult and expensive. It also keeps in place “too big to fail.” There is an implicit guarantee that if large banks start to go under, the taxpayer will bail them out.
Those interested in both economic justice and sound policy should stand with the South Dakota Legislature and favor a reinstatement of the Glass-Steagall Act.
Comments