Lift those burdens
President Donald Trump signed the biggest rollback of bank regulations since the global financial crisis into law Thursday.
The measure designed to ease rules on all but the largest banks passed both chambers of Congress with bipartisan support. Backers say the legislation will lift burdens unnecessarily put on small and medium-sized lenders by the Dodd-Frank financial reform act and boost economic growth.
Opponents, however, have argued the changes could open taxpayers to more liability if the financial system collapses or increase the chances of discrimination in mortgage lending.
Cough Silicon cough Valley cough Bank cough
The measure eases restrictions on all but the largest banks. It raises the threshold to $250 billion from $50 billion under which banks are deemed too important to the financial system to fail. Those institutions also would not have to undergo stress tests or submit so-called living wills, both safety valves designed to plan for financial disaster.
Silicon Valley what now?
A great many meaningful political differences are concealed under the flimsy veil of “bipartisan support.” Here, for example, “bipartisan support” means that EVERY Republican in the House at the time voted for the bill, and about 17% of the Democrats in the House at the time voted for it. The Senate vote was a bit more bipartisan, with 35% of the Democrats joining all the Republicans. Even allowing for the reality that many of those Democratic votes in both directions were mere postures — essentially symbolic or strategic support for one side or the other, since the Republicans had the votes to pass the legislation without a single Democrat — the claim of “bipartisanship” is pretty thin. The reality is that deregulation is a Republican priority and that post-DLC Democrats have overwhelmingly opposed it.