Saving Consumers from Themselves
The trouble with Obama’s proposal for a Consumer Financial Protection Agency
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Despite the capitulations, the CFPA will still wind up damaging companies and ultimately hurting consumers. What looks like movement in the right direction is largely a smoke screen to disguise the fact that a Frank designed CFPA will still have power to force the standardization of some products.
Furthermore, Frank has yet to deal with other significant concerns about what the new agency will do to businesses and the market.
In a report released on September 23, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce (USCC) revealed that the CFPA would cause significant harm to small businesses by imposing high fixed costs for complying with the new regulatory burden. These compliance costs are more easily handled by large firms, which have sophisticated legal staff to work through the piles of regulation.
Michael E. Fryzel, former chairman of the National Credit Union Administration said, "The proposed legislation could cause financial institutions to incur additional costs, including those for fees, staff training, and policy development. The higher operating expenses associated with compliance could have a negative impact on the availability of credit." Given that 70 percent of the USCC's 3 million-plus members are small businesses with less than 10 employees, it is easy to understand how overly burdensome new consumer protection rules could cripple growth and lead to many closures.
The USCC also argues that the CFPA would likely reduce small business access to credit, limit start-ups, damage employment opportunities, and favor large financial firms with "one-size-fits all" rules. As Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke has warned:
There are many issues to consider, including that overly restrictive or burdensome regulations can lead to increases in product pricing or product withdrawals that would overly constrain credit, or in extreme cases, severely impact the availability of responsible credit for consumers.
In addition to limiting credit and expansion opportunities for small businesses, the CFPA would create brain-knotting problems for large firms. Frank's CFPA, like the Obama/Warren version, would require banks to follow both national and state rules for consumer protection. The Wall Street Journal noted that "each state could impose different rules for pricing, product features, repayment schedules, bank capital requirements, consumer disclosure, regulatory reporting requirements, and so on. If each state can set its own rules, expect endless legal confusion over which law prevails when a bank in one state serves a customer in another."
Consider this complication: If Maryland declares a financial product unsafe, could it still be advertised on television in the northern Virginia and Washington D.C. markets where the signal stretches into Maryland? Would someone living in Virginia and working in D.C. not be allowed to use an IRA or 401(k) plan deemed too dangerous by one of those jurisdictions? Without clearly defined federal preemption, large financial institutions could suddenly find themselves subjected to oversight from the attorneys general in every state they do business, a radical shift from the current paradigm.
Unfortunately, the problems with the CFPA go even deeper than that. Consolidating all federal consumer financial protection regulation would divorce "safety and soundness" regulatory oversight from consumer oversight of financial institutions. There is an important complementary relationship between the two that the CFPA would rip apart. As John Bowman, acting director of the Office of Thrift Supervision (a division of the Tim Geithner-run Treasury Department), has said:
Dividing the regulation of safety and soundness and consumer protection would undermine the safety and soundness of the banking system and weaken a regulator's ability to formulate a complete assessment of a financial institution's risk profile.
Fed Chairman Bernanke, recently reappointed by President Obama to another term, has also pointed out this flaw in the CFPA's design:
In the Reserve Banks, the consumer compliance examiners, while specially trained, often share senior management with the prudential examiners. So, at that level, it would not necessarily be a clean transfer. Additionally, the Reserve Bank examiners draw on expertise and knowledge from other areas of the organizations. Those knowledge centers would not be part of the transfer to a new agency... We believe that prudential supervision and consumer compliance are complementary and should not be separated."
This was a proven bad practice at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. James Lockhart, the former head of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, has testified that a separation of consumer protection from financial safety and soundness regulation at those government-sponsored enterprises was a definite cause of their downfall.
Smarter, more effective regulation is the answer to fixing consumer financial protection problems. Consumers don't need new layers of regulation leading to more confusion, uncertainty, and lost value. Instead, regulators should focus on vigorous, effective enforcement of current laws against predatory practices and abuse. There is also room for making sure the existing web of agencies covers all regulatory gaps.
As the Consumer Financial Protection Agency stands now, it is President Obama, Elizabeth Warren, and Barney Frank collectively slamming an arm across the collective chest of the nation's businesses and consumers. We're trying to drive an economy here! We don't need to be protected to death.
Anthony Randazzo is a policy analyst for Reason Foundation.
Editor's Note: We invite comments and request that they be civil and on-topic. We do not moderate or assume any responsibility for comments, which are owned by the readers who post them. Comments do not represent the views of Reason.com or Reason Foundation. We reserve the right to delete any comment for any reason at any time.
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It is a damn shame there's no alt text on that picture.
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From the point of view of the Democrats in the House Financial Services Committee ... consumers need a single, all-knowing agency to protect them, one that has the power to scan the whole market and assess the dangers of different products.
Sounds like "In God We Trust".
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Does anyone in politics even care about Constitutional law anymore? Saving you from yourself? That's so stupid, I can do whatever I want to myself.
You know, I love free will, but it is so hard to believe in it when there are so many dumbfucks out there who would just fuck us all over.
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Caption:
"Yes, I know Professor Krugman."
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The biggest problem IMO, is the state thing. We should be making it simpler for businesses to comply. Just like it should be simpler for a consumer to know what they are getting into.
That being said, unless you change the incentive structure it won't matter. If you reward a mortgage broker for the amount of shitty mortgages he can sell, guess what he's going to sell?
Also, why the fuck do we have so many damm agencies. Like we really need one for thrifts, one for banks etc. I say yes, combine and simplify.
Finally, people had more than enough information to see the crises coming. There were many people that pointed it out publically, and repeatedly.
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"And he said he just want to put the tip in and I said what do you mean by tip and then he did this with his fingers and I said OK."
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0
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... the CFPA will pile on burdensome new rules, restrict innovation, hurt small businesses, increase the cost of doing business, spawn a massive bureaucracy, and create severe conflicts between state and federal law.
IOW, touches all the bases.
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The Squirrel (praised be his name) magnaminously grants me Preview and like the sinner I am, I ignored it in my previous. But he is a merciful Squirrel who forgives my transgressions when I repent. -
I should sooner live in a society governed by the first two thousand names in the Boston telephone directory than in a society governed by Cass Sunstein and Elizabeth Warren.
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Couldn't agree more, considerably more democratic and at least my voice is heard.
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Rarely has there ever been a picture so desperately in need of a caption.
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But this wins votes. And when the banks seek their lost profits by raising other fees to their customers, the customers will blame the big greedy banks, not the government.
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What's wrong with a committee outside of the legislative body that isn't accountable to voters making laws that they know couldn't get through a body actually accountable to the governed if it's to protect people? I don't see how that could be bad. Aren't these the right people in charge?
And who are you to question the president, Randazzo? Do you have a Nobel prize? Racist. -
"Look, just because he's half black...."
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Currently, consumers are protected by a layering of federal agencies, depending on the type of financial institution and its corresponding regulator.
"protected"? Link? Change it to "fucked over" and then I'll agree.
Putting the word "Protection" in an Orwellian title doesn't mean that's what they'll do, just as putting the word "security" in "Homeland Security" doesn't mean that's what the fucking TSA is doing to you in airports.
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mr simple says, in part: "What's wrong with a committee outside of the legislative body that isn't accountable to voters making laws that they know couldn't get through a body actually accountable to the governed if it's to protect people? I don't see how that could be bad. Aren't these the right people in charge?"
Precisely. And it need not be justified by being written in order to protect people. The rubrics of "punishing the evil-doers" as well as "smiting the illiberal capitalists" and "making income distribution more equitable" and let's not forget "tax the rich". All good! Yes, indeedy! When the imagination of the excuse-makers falters, use this: "We won the election!" Never fails.
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caption - "The Obama Administration: Helping Americans make do with less"
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the CFPA will pile on burdensome new rules, restrict innovation, hurt small businesses, increase the cost of doing business, spawn a massive bureaucracy, and create severe conflicts between state and federal law.
Bugs, or features? Only your Congressscum knows for sure!
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"I'm crushing you're head..."
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I wonder how mom reacted to being mentioned in the article.
Did she point the finger back at Anthony?
Did she blame her own mother (the previous administration)?
Did ACORN buy her the car?
Maybe, she even won the Nobel Peace Prize !?
Mmm, mmm, mmm,
Anthony Randazzo's mommy. . .Inquiring minds want to know!
Loved the reasoning Anthony, and I hope mom can take a joke ;)
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The biggest problem of the CFPA is that Obama envisions using it to step up pressure on banks to make risky, low-income loans under the Community Reinvestment Act, which helped spawn the mortgage crisis, and which punishes banks for failing to engage in geographic affirmative action in lending.
The white paper explaining Obama's proposals denigrates existing law, under which the Community Reinvestment Act is enforced not by zealouts, but by neutral agencies that balance its goals against the competing goal of bank safety and soundness, reducing those agencies' obsession with pressuring banks to make risky low-income loans.
I explain this, with links to Obama's proposals and the white paper, at The Examiner, and at Openmarket.org.
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Congress has already given in to this paternalistic urge by passing the credit card act in May 2009. That law tried to keep banks from charging high interest rates and fees, but instead has only served to restrict available credit, especially for low-income borrowers.
This behavior was clearly not pre-approved by the left and is henceforth declared illegal and racist.
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My only point is that if you take the Bible straight, as I'm sure many of Reasons readers do, you will see a lot of the Old Testament stuff as absolutely insane. Even some cursory knowledge of Hebrew and doing some mathematics and logic will tell you that you really won't get the full deal by just doing regular skill english reading for those books.