The Real Cost Of New Bank Regulation TO All Of Us

Dodd Frank was bad enough of an overreaction to the crash, but the follow on has been far worse and is now damaging the economy. First we had the Obama Holder personal vendetta against Jamie Dimon to punish him for actually having the temerity to speak the truth publicly instead of towing the administration party line. That $20 billion personal attack has cost hundreds of good jobs at JPM, and will continue to restrain hiring and spending by the bank for several years. Who lost- the lower and mid level people who got cut or never got hired. As important the economy suffered as that was capital which could have gone to capital and been used to make loans to all of you. The same has been done to B of A, and others. While JPM and B of A made some mistakes, none of it was criminal, and punishing the economy and lower level workers accomplished nothing good. Nobody seems to have held the bond buyers accountable for not doing their due diligence and buying the junk without thinking or working.

Now we have the real issue for all of us.  The follow on to all of this is the avalanche of regulatory burden that has befallen all of the major banks. Even though it will never stop a crooked individual from trying to beat the system, the banks are now tied in knots with paperwork and compliance rules that are causing the system to become dysfunctional. Talk to almost any banker today and you will hear that the paperwork burden is killing them, and they can’t be bankers serving their clients like they want to be because the regulatory burden is so crushing. Whether it is line bankers at retail, private bankers who now must sign documents saying their clients have been investigated and are not money launderers or drug dealers, or commercial real estate lenders, they all have to do so much know your customer and follow on work that they have no time to do banker work serving clients. The result is there are now a lot of very angry and frustrated bankers at all levels who want to make loans and do the other things that bankers do, but they spend so  much time on regulatory work they hate it now. All while budgets are cut to have the capital to pay over to Holder so he and Obama can tout to Elizabeth Warren and her coterie, that they are really going after the greedy bankers. May make good short term politics but in the end it is terrible politics because it costs thousands of jobs in all the banks and causes lending to be materially curtailed. Capital that would otherwise have been there to back stop the bank balance sheets has been paid to the administration to help close the deficit loophole along with the illegal payments of dividends from Fannie and Freddie instead of to shareholders. So the government gets billions, and borrowers get no loans and reduced service.