The Dodd-Frank Paper Trail

http://www.futureofcapitalism.com/2011/05/the-dodd-frank-paper-trail

The Wall Street Journal has a nifty news article about the amount of paper generated in Washington by Dodd-Frank-related rulemaking. "The process has produced more than three million words in the Federal Register—or more than 3,500 11-inch-high pages," which the Journal says laid end-to-end would be the equivalent of 2.6 Empire State Buildings. "And about 62% of the 387 sets of rules required by the law haven't even been proposed, according to law firm Davis Polk & Wardwell."

Imagine the number of lawyers and lobbyists a company has to pay to attempt to keep track of all this stuff.

Meanwhile, House Republicans like Shelley Moore Capito, chairman of the House Subcommittee on Financial Institutions and Consumer Credit, and Spencer Bachus, chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, are tinkering. Ms. Capito has an op-ed in USA Today explaining she wants to replace the director of the Dodd-Frank-created Consumer Financial Protection Bureau with a five-member commission. This, she explains, "follows the standard structure for other product regulators, such as the Consumer Product Safety Commission." Now there's a model to emulate.

Mr. Bachus's legislation would replace one full-time government employee with five. A press release quotes supporters of the idea explaining, "the commission model...has worked well for the FDIC, SEC, and FTC." Splendid. I know everyone's afraid of Elizabeth Warren as the sole director of this Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, but is this really what we need House Republicans for? To quintuple federal employees and create another alphabet-soup style regulatory agency?

by Editor  |  May 2, 2011 at 10:56 am Related Topics:  Capital Markets Regulation, FDIC, SEC receive the latest by email: subscribe to the free futureofcapitalism.com mailing list