Why Financial Regulatory Reform Worries Me
Financial regulatory reform is here. You'll see stories about the good and the bad. Some like the fact that any reform was passed. Others fear the new regulations will adversely affect American business at a time when the economy is struggling. Still others don't think the reform was enough.
The proposed increase in regulation of the financial services industry obviously concerns me. The agencies that oversee my part of the industry have come out with new regulations and are proposing even more regulations that could make doing business some combination of more cumbersome, expensive and, frankly, risky. But that's my problem, not yours.
As for the effects the regulations will have on markets going forward, we'll have to wait and see. The last time I wrote about this in detail, I expressed some specific concerns about the proposed regs. Those concerns remain.
But it goes beyond that.
While I really think that reform is needed, and I agree that unbelievable abuses took place that have not been adequately addressed, I'm not sure they're being adequately addressed now. Worse, I wonder if the current regs do more to increase increase the government's control of all our lives, rather than really fix what's wrong with Wall Street.
When I was a student in the 1970's, I worked for a chemical manufacturing firm in the R & D department. We were responsible for the testing of various products, many of which had to be approved by the FDA (Food and Drug Administration).
Our R&D library carried volumes of the Federal Register. The Federal Register, by its own description, contains "rules, proposed rules, and notices of Federal agencies and organizations, as well as executive orders and other presidential documents."
In the '70's, it published approximately 450,000 pages. If you think that's an astounding number of official proclamations of rules, notices, executive orders and other documents, you're right. Until you find out that in the first decade of the 21st Century, it publishes almost 750,000 pages!
As a matter of fact, the number of pages published by the Federal Register is a good gauge of the scope and rate of increase of federal power. Can you see that?
When you add this to the taxes the government collects along with the money they are spending via deficit spending and borrowing, the picture becomes clearer. Our government has grown immensely since my days submitting test results to the FDA. In fact, it's rate of growth and it's reach into our lives via ever-increasing rules and executive orders is accelerating as never before.
We Americans like to believe we are a "free" people. We encourage (encourage is sometimes putting it mildly) other countries to imitate our democratic form of government. People from other countries come here to live, seeking more freedom.
But with ever-increasing regulations and government involvement in more and more aspects of our lives, how long will we be free - or how free will we be?
Maybe I'm making too big a deal about all this. Then again, there's no denying that financial regulatory reform isn't just an isolated piece of legislation. It's part of a bigger, broader trend that really worries me at times.
The proposed increase in regulation of the financial services industry obviously concerns me. The agencies that oversee my part of the industry have come out with new regulations and are proposing even more regulations that could make doing business some combination of more cumbersome, expensive and, frankly, risky. But that's my problem, not yours.
As for the effects the regulations will have on markets going forward, we'll have to wait and see. The last time I wrote about this in detail, I expressed some specific concerns about the proposed regs. Those concerns remain.
But it goes beyond that.
While I really think that reform is needed, and I agree that unbelievable abuses took place that have not been adequately addressed, I'm not sure they're being adequately addressed now. Worse, I wonder if the current regs do more to increase increase the government's control of all our lives, rather than really fix what's wrong with Wall Street.
When I was a student in the 1970's, I worked for a chemical manufacturing firm in the R & D department. We were responsible for the testing of various products, many of which had to be approved by the FDA (Food and Drug Administration).
Our R&D library carried volumes of the Federal Register. The Federal Register, by its own description, contains "rules, proposed rules, and notices of Federal agencies and organizations, as well as executive orders and other presidential documents."
In the '70's, it published approximately 450,000 pages. If you think that's an astounding number of official proclamations of rules, notices, executive orders and other documents, you're right. Until you find out that in the first decade of the 21st Century, it publishes almost 750,000 pages!
As a matter of fact, the number of pages published by the Federal Register is a good gauge of the scope and rate of increase of federal power. Can you see that?
When you add this to the taxes the government collects along with the money they are spending via deficit spending and borrowing, the picture becomes clearer. Our government has grown immensely since my days submitting test results to the FDA. In fact, it's rate of growth and it's reach into our lives via ever-increasing rules and executive orders is accelerating as never before.
We Americans like to believe we are a "free" people. We encourage (encourage is sometimes putting it mildly) other countries to imitate our democratic form of government. People from other countries come here to live, seeking more freedom.
But with ever-increasing regulations and government involvement in more and more aspects of our lives, how long will we be free - or how free will we be?
Maybe I'm making too big a deal about all this. Then again, there's no denying that financial regulatory reform isn't just an isolated piece of legislation. It's part of a bigger, broader trend that really worries me at times.
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