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That's a little uncharitable. It's obvious that Senator Warren's real question is: Do the banks have any reason to feel as if they face a threat of real legal a
by Cushman 14y ago
That's a little uncharitable. It's obvious that Senator Warren's real question is: Do the banks have any reason to feel as if they face a threat of real legal action if they break the rules?
If not, that's surely something we can and should change.
- chetanahuja 14y agos/break the rules/break the laws/ Completely different meaning. If ate a bar of chocolate in the library despite posted signs against eating and drinking. I broke a rule. If I threw my chocolate bar at the librarian's face with an intent to injure him, I broke a law (assault and injury etc.)
- Cushman 14y agoAnd if there wasn't anything you could do to land yourself in court, wouldn't you start to wonder if there are any real laws at all?
- chetanahuja 14y agoOh there's no doubt that laws were and are being broken by top banks every single day. The problem is that they have enough concentration of power on their side (in most western countries) that it's almost impossible for the feeble democratic institutions to effectively punish them.
- tptacek 14y agoI don't mean to be uncharitable. I'm glad Elizabeth Warren is there. She's demagoguing, but so is everyone else, and her side of the argument is underrepresented. But it's not at all clear --- in fact, it seems unlikely --- that the core problem we face is a refusal by regulators to sue. It seems more likely that the core problem is that the economic incentives in the finance industry, or at least in commercial banking, favor rapid and aggressive consolidation. Not enough disincentive exists to offset the externalities this creates. Maybe we should tax banks based on their sizes; maybe we should do that in the form of some kind of insurance premium. But since anything we'd do to address any of the real problems is going to require bipartisan cooperation, first we need to be candid about what the problems are.