Krugman on Finance Reform: Go Big, or Go Home

No reform better than current Senate bill
By Kevin Spak,  Newser Staff
Posted Mar 1, 2010 8:15 AM CST
Krugman on Finance Reform: Go Big, or Go Home
Paul Krugman, Princeton University professor of economics and international affairs, talks about the economy at a gathering in Princeton, Oct. 13, 2008.   (AP Photo/Mel Evans)

Paul Krugman comes out against passing a watered down financial regulatory reform bill today, saying the current Senate bill would provide only a “false sense of security and a fig leaf for politicians opposed to any serious action.” Republicans, driven by bank lobbyists and their strategy of opposing anything the Obama administration proposes, are fighting to kill real financial reform efforts. Should Democrats try to compromise? “I say no,” he writes in the New York Times.

With health care reform, an imperfect bill might be okay, because we can improve it over time. But here, the law will just excuse inaction until another crisis hits. Consumers need an independent protection agency, for starters—if they didn’t, banks wouldn’t be lobbying against one. “It’s time to draw a line in the sand. No reform, coupled with a campaign to name and shame the people responsible, is better than a cosmetic reform.” (More Paul Krugman stories.)

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