American Banker: Bernanke and Geithner Defend Crisis Response as Some Challenge Legacy
American Banker: Bernanke and Geithner Defend Crisis Response as Some Challenge Legacy
The former Federal Reserve chairman and former Treasury Department secretary appeared at a question-and-answer book talk at Barnes & Noble's Union Square store in New York. Many of the questions dealt with the financial crisis, so the night may have been a more pleasant experience for the audience than for Geithner and Bernanke.
Some of those on hand Tuesday night disagreed that their response was a success. A few protesters vocalized their support for the National Emergency Employment Defense (NEED) Act, authored by former Rep. Dennis Kucinich in 2011. The legislation included provisions to create a ceiling on interest rates, form a monetary authority to shape monetary supply policy and replace Federal Reserve notes with U.S. money.
"People may not appreciate that the Dodd-Frank regulation authority has within it the power to break up the banks," Bernanke said. "The power is there, so I feel if you can't get to the point where you think 'too big to fail' is well controlled, it would not take more congressional action to do that."
A question about Glass-Steagall submitted from the audience drew a rousing response from Bernanke, who emphatically stated that he doesn't understand when people cite that law as a cause of the crisis.
"Deregulation was a mistake, but why Glass-Steagall is always the poster child of that, I don't really understand," Bernanke said. "Most of the firms that got in trouble were either investment banks or commercial banks.
It was more or less irrelevant to the crisis that we had."
Fun fact, there's a publication named "American Banker".
Senator Elizabeth Warren - Reinstating Glass-Steagall: