Pathetically, a large part of this is partisan. The Republican party was never, in recent decades, happy to prosecute big business for this kind of crime. It's

Pathetically, a large part of this is partisan. The Republican party was never, in recent decades, happy to prosecute big business for this kind of crime. It's the Democratic party which ever in recent memory had any willingness to prosecute big business, and largely lost that, because it hurts in elections. Democrats automatically lose independents without some message of non-partisanship (perverse that white-collar criminals have a party). So we get these weak moves which are then further blunted by the Republican party, so the Democrats can symbolically do something and the Republicans can symbolically label them as Communist Nazis without doing anything. The Tea Party and mainstream, Ron Paul Libertarian Party are focused on eliminating Democrats (i.e., Communist Nazis) and starting an armed revolution to ensure permanent right-wing rule any day now, but maybe not just yet until they get a few more votes - no declarations of non-partisanship required for these - but even if you could get them down to it, they wouldn't be willing to prosecute big business either. And many of the rest, including a lot of people involved in startups, are temporarily embarrassed millionaires voting reflexively against words like regulation and taxes even though that kind of policy is unlikely to ever benefit them. But even if anyone was willing to be seen "punishing wealth creators" and "discouraging business" and "killing jobs" in this partisan climate, nobody of any party will want to face the political blowback for expanding bureaucracy and spending more money. There is a strong, non-partisan general allergy of the voting public to regulation, enforcement, and government in general.