Most likely you’ve heard of Dodd-Frank, formally known as the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, but haven’t paid much attention to it because you don’t see it affecting you directly.
Without getting into the weeds, I think you should know that the Obama administration – Big Government – has done it again. As with the Affordable Care Act (ObamaCare), the president signed a bill before its regulations and rules were written. The establishment of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to oversee credit and debit card matters is perhaps the best known feature, but its reach across the financial community is massive. It is predicted that financial institutions will be dealing with its consequences, intended and unintended, for many years,
“The Act” bears their names – former Sen. Christopher Dodd (D-CT) and former Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA) – and both are long gone from office. (politico.com)
Dodd-Frank gave the unelected council of bank regulators the unilateral power to rewrite the rules, including those involving insurance. Now they are powerless to intervene in a consideration whether MetLife is too big to fail because of the council’s overreaching.
Signed four years ago, regulators and financial institutions are still struggling with “the Act,” as it has become known. It calls for more than 200 rulemakings and 67 studies. As of late last year, 60 percent of the deadlines had been missed and 30 percent of the mandated rules hadn’t even been proposed.
“The Act” was supposed to solve the “too big to fail” situation, but in the meantime, the four biggest banks are 30 percent larger than five years ago, and they hold more than half of the total banking assets in the country.
(Cartoon courtesy stoneoforthanic.blogspot.com)
Just as the administration continues to provide unconstitutional waivers and changes in ObamaCare for special interests, they now must face the consequences for meddling in another industry. They began with the auto industry and extended to ill-conceived energy projects like Solyndra. Health insurance was next with ObamaCare, followed by Dodd-Frank.
What’s ahead? Look for climate change compliance and amnesty for millions.
