Romney is so much more sophisticated and economically literate than Obama, it's scary.
STENGEL: Another sort of related business question, if you look at the regulatory environment for the banks now and there are basically five big banks that in terms of assets disproportionately outweigh everybody else, is there a situation of moral hazard now related to those banks? And what would you do to reform the financial sector? Would you bring something back like Glass-Steagall? How do you see it, Governor?
ROMNEY: I think Dodd-Frank has contributed to a concentration of banking assets into the hands of a small number of banks. By designating certain banks as being too big to fail, strategically important banks, it makes it more difficult for the banks not so designated to attract customers and to expand their business. What you’ve seen as a result is a concentration in the hands of a handful of banks that now has greater systemic threat that what even existed before.
The right course was not to say that this handful of banks will be protected by the government, implying therefore that all the rest of the banks are on their own, because smart depositors will all move towards the banks that are protected by government. It had the opposite effect of what was advertised. What was advertised was that we would keep the too big to fail banks from getting bigger, but the result of the legislation is just the opposite.
What we need to do is to make it easier for the community and local banks and regional banks to succeed and thrive because they, after all, are the places where small and medium-size businesses get their funding. So the whole idea of designating a handful of banks as the government-protected too big to fail banks is the wrong course.
Now, we do need to have regulation in the banking industry. Extensive regulation is appropriate in an industry that has such an impact on the overall economy. We have to look at what the causes were of the last crisis and take action to prevent those causes from reappearing. What kinds of things come to mind include capital requirements, levels of leverage which are appropriate and inappropriate, banks maintaining risk in assets which they gather. Specifically, I’m referring to the idea if a bank originates a loan or a mortgage that it should be on the hook for some portion of the loss if that loan or mortgage fails. These kinds of provisions, I think, would be directly applicable to the kind of crisis that we experienced before.
A Certain Enthusiasm: Romney Edges Toward Banking Reform
He knows his stuff in a way Obama never has.
