More important than air traffic control is to place bank regulation in a public/private non-profit entity

Sir, Gillian Tett discusses the head of the US Council of Economic Advisers’, Gary Cohn, plan to take the air traffic control system away from the Federal Aviation Administration and place it in a non-profit entity, funded by public and private finance. “Canada inspires US reform plans to take off”, April 7.

Sounds like a good idea but, much more important for both America and Canada, would be to place bank regulations in the hands of such an entity… like a BankReg.org!

I mean would BankReg.org have gotten away, like current bank regulators have, with regulating banks without defining the purpose of banks? No way Jose!

I mean would BankReg.org have gotten away, like current bank regulators have, to regulate banks without empirical analysis of what has caused the bank crises in the past? No way Jose!

I mean would BankReg.org have gotten away, like current bank regulators have, with making it harder than it always has been for “risky” SMEs and entrepreneurs to access bank credit? No way Jose!

I mean would BankReg.org have gotten away, like current bank regulators have, with risk-weighing the Sovereign with 0%, and We the People with 100%, and thereby through the Bathroom Window introducing runaway statism? No way Jose!

I mean would BankReg.org have gotten away, like current bank regulators have, with risk-weighing the dangerous corporate AAA rated with 20%, while assigning a 150% risk weight to the so innocuous below BB- rated? No way Jose!

I mean would BankReg.org have gotten away, like current bank regulators have, with giving banks incentives to finance the “safe” basements were our unemployed kids can live over those, who though riskier, could provide our kids with the jobs they need in order to also have kids and basements? No way Jose!

I mean would those working in BankReg.org have gotten away, like current bank regulators have, with not having some psychological tests made on them in order to guarantee their suitability? No way Jose!

I mean would BankReg.org have gotten away, like current bank regulators have, with causing the 2007-08 crisis without suffering any consequences for it… in some cases even being promoted? No way Jose! We would have sued and fined its technocrats for their last socks!

I mean would FT have treated BankReg.org as leniently as it has treated the Basel Committee for Banking Supervision, the Financial Stability Board, IMF and other clearly failed bank regulators? No way Jose!

PS. Here are some of my questions looking for answers

@PerKurowski

Unfortunately the fight for the best gate-watching positions is a never-ending story

Sir, I can certainly identify with Dr. Thomas Snitch’s despair when, quoted by Gillian Tett, he cries out “These folks would rather turn down the offer of free help to save the rhinos than to be put in a position where their annual report states that fewer animals are being taken by poachers” … and thus undermine their ability to raise money, “Wild animals, poachers and the human jungle” August 25. 

And quite often it is much worse, since “these folks”, these think-tank’s without ideas but with a “concern” that defines their business model, often monopolize the public debate on “their” issue. Indeed some of “these folks” are really like powerful multinational corporations operating with much less of that transparency they often accused others to be lacking. 

But Dr. Snitch, thanks to another gate-keeper, Gillian Tett, at least here got himself a chance to describe what he was up to. And that is much more than what others who are being ignored by the media and the journalists who, also feeling threatened, take refuge in the hierarchy of their own little net-works or in their own officially approved little intellectual silos. 

Thankfully the world is changing, and insignificant persons like me now have, because of the web, better chances of bypassing the gate-watchers in order to voice any significant concerns of theirs… and perhaps even to be able to challenge one or two hierarchies. 

PS. A Challenge!