Weakening Dodd-Frank: Our view
In the fall of 2008 as the world's banking system was melting down, fear for the future was widespread. And so were two other emotions. One, from some Wall Street high rollers, was distress from having bet the house in the name of quick profits. The other, from the American public and lawmakers, was anger over having to bail out the high rollers to prevent a global depression.
Wall Street got its swagger back not long after the bailout, which is no surprise. Its culture is built on greed and ego. What is more surprising is how quickly Congress again became Wall Street's errand boy.
The very first thing that the Republican-controlled House brought up this year didn't have to do with combating terrorism. Or with addressing middle-class wages. Nope, it was a measure to let big, federally insured banks increase their risk profiles.
The bill — which passed the House but faces a veto if it reaches President Obama's desk — would allow big banks to continue holding high-risk loans that the 2010 Wall Street reform law required them to divest. It would also ban regulators from requiring the banks to maintain cash balances as a buffer should they suffer losses in the markets for complex financial instruments called derivatives.
This solicitude for Wall Street — from the GOP majorities in the House and Senate, joined by some moderate Democrats — came on the heels of an even bigger gift in the spending bill passed late last year. That measure undid a provision of the 2010 law, known as Dodd-Frank, that required banks to move derivatives trades to units that don't benefit from federal backing.
The reason for these favors is simple: money. In the past three elections, Wall Street has given $153 million to Democrats and $256 million to Republicans. The donations are part of an effort by the banks to chip away at financial reform — in the courts, regulatory agencies and Congress.
Next up, banking interests want to weaken the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which has done an effective job of cracking down on misleading lending schemes. Another Wall Street priority is to let major financial institutions get around the designation of "systemically important," a status that subjects them to more stringent rules.
The Wall Street reform law was passed for a reason: to avoid a repeat of 2008. It is overly bureaucratic in places and has other flaws. But it has forced banks to maintain stronger balance sheets, reduce predatory lending and cut back marginally on risk taking.
When the law was being crafted, Congress had to choose between breaking up the "too big to fail" banks or trying to force them to behave. It opted for the latter, in part because breakup was seen as the more radical solution.
Now the banks that fought breakup insist that they should be allowed again to take huge risks. Never mind that many of them benefit immensely from federally insured deposits and would have to be rescued by taxpayers if they faltered.
It's time for lawmakers to think more about 2008, when the world was on the brink of financial catastrophe, and less about doing big favors for the monied interests that were largely responsible for the crisis.
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