Comments on: Obama To Announce Massive Financial Regulation Overhaul http://donklephant.com/2009/06/17/obama-to-announce-massive-financial-regulation-overhaul/ Big Teeth. Huge Ass. Surprisingly Reasonable. Mon, 23 Nov 2009 13:07:11 -0800 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.4 hourly 1 By: Trescml http://donklephant.com/2009/06/17/obama-to-announce-massive-financial-regulation-overhaul/comment-page-1/#comment-487127 Trescml Wed, 17 Jun 2009 18:19:58 +0000 http://donklephant.com/?p=15217#comment-487127 This in the end will only help a little bit. Tighter rules are nice, but if there isn't the desire to enforce the rules due to pressure from either Congress or the White House, it won't amount to much. The institutions are still so large that the failure of one can still have a huge impact on the economy, so the natural risk/gain goes right out the window. This in the end will only help a little bit. Tighter rules are nice, but if there isn’t the desire to enforce the rules due to pressure from either Congress or the White House, it won’t amount to much. The institutions are still so large that the failure of one can still have a huge impact on the economy, so the natural risk/gain goes right out the window.

]]> By: kranky kritter http://donklephant.com/2009/06/17/obama-to-announce-massive-financial-regulation-overhaul/comment-page-1/#comment-486969 kranky kritter Wed, 17 Jun 2009 13:08:30 +0000 http://donklephant.com/?p=15217#comment-486969 I agree that this sort of stuff deserves to happen in the wake of the negligent and fraudulent behavior that went on in various sectors related to the creation and perpetuation of the since-burst real estate bubble. And I am a huge advocate of protecting and informing consumers. Still, the skeptic in me can't help but to wonder whether the end result of additional mandatory disclosure rules will be no more than to add 4 to 8 pages to the various lengthy reports that get mailed to folks so that they can toss them into the recycling bin without even opening them. Mandatory disclosure is nice, but it's insufficient. We need to mandate clarity, intelligibility, brevity, digestability, and so on. In other words, to mandate that a certain message be delivered is important, but it's useless unless we also take steps to make sure the message is actually received and understood by recipients. Or else the rules will do no real good. I agree that this sort of stuff deserves to happen in the wake of the negligent and fraudulent behavior that went on in various sectors related to the creation and perpetuation of the since-burst real estate bubble.

And I am a huge advocate of protecting and informing consumers.

Still, the skeptic in me can’t help but to wonder whether the end result of additional mandatory disclosure rules will be no more than to add 4 to 8 pages to the various lengthy reports that get mailed to folks so that they can toss them into the recycling bin without even opening them.

Mandatory disclosure is nice, but it’s insufficient. We need to mandate clarity, intelligibility, brevity, digestability, and so on. In other words, to mandate that a certain message be delivered is important, but it’s useless unless we also take steps to make sure the message is actually received and understood by recipients. Or else the rules will do no real good.

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