Banking. Too big to fail banking. The Federal Reserve. A rather large problem that won’t go away soon, especially if everything remains status quo. An organization called Fed Up, in connection with the Center for Popular Democracy (both progressive organizations), have called for a major overhaul of the Federal Reserve system. Unlike other progressive calls to merely break the big banks up, Fed Up’s big picture suggestion is to have the Federal Reserve become a public institution, wresting power and control from Wall Street banks, in addition to breaking the big ones up.
Andrew Levin, a Dartmouth economist and former adviser to the Fed chair, who authored the proposal, said on a call with reporters that the changes would bring the Fed’s structure into line with major central banks in other countries. He mocked the plain conflict of interest inherent in giving the financial industry so much power over an institution charged with regulating it. “It should be amazing for people in the public that banks actually own shares in the Fed. A lot of people would be shocked to hear that,” Levin said. “It would be like if lawyers owned shares in the FBI,” he added.
We can’t say we disagree with his assessment, but we’d like to see something akin to the Bank of North Dakota. Given that North Dakota is a top ten Republican led, red state (as of 2012, via Gallup), we’d like to believe that beltway Republicans could get behind the idea or something similar. Probably not. The truth is that both parties are complicit in surrendering control to the highest bidder (oops, was that just typed?), and the hierarchy of each party would fight it. In this case, it’s a progressive push, but yesterday it was a conservative push (remember Ron Paul’s Audit the Fed?).
Ultimately, it’s up to the voters of both sides to come together to reign in the beast we call ‘The Fed.’ In fact, we can’t think of any better subject with which to unite both sides, from each extreme, and all in between. Between the hold of Wall Street, and judicial decisions like Citizens United and McCutchen vs. the FEC, we the people are ignored. We must wrest control from the larger moneyed interests. Then, and sadly, only then, can we really start working towards a level playing field for most.
Additional Info: How the Nation’s Only State-Owned Bank Became the Envy of Wall Street
