Friday, July 16, 2010

Major defects with the financial services deform bill

1.  Most of the regulations are "to be determined" by regulators.  On the bright side, this may set up a way to repeal most of it through the courts, which have previously voided laws according to Article 1 of the Constitution.  Regulatory uncertainty is an economic killer.

2.  Massive set-asides for unions and other groups in a modification of proxy voting rules. 

3.  Massive paperwork requirements for ordinary transactions--it will be a killer for small business.

4.  No modification of rules for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, whose demand for mortgage securities was a large part of the real estate cataclysm.

5.  No examination of the CRA--in fact, set asides act as an expansion of the CRA.

In short, when given a choice between ways of improving and worsening the situation, Frank and Dodd chose making the situation worse with laserlike precision.

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