Political Quotes

“If the Senator would yield, I thank the Senator for bringing out that there is such broad support, as we are seeing, from economists as conservative as Alan Greenspan and as progressive as Bob Reich, and others, who say too big to fail means simply too big. Our amendment will only affect the six largest banks--affect their size--and it will affect smaller banks in helping them be more competitive. You said something on the Senate floor yesterday that, in effect, the size of these banks gives them a subsidy, a roughly 75 basis point or three-quarters of 1 percent advantage in the capital markets. This amendment we have, which is gaining increasing support--we have now 10 or 11 cosponsors to it, and we are working with people on both sides-- simply to say too big to fail is too big. Talk to us for a moment about how these banks get the subsidies. Somebody in my office said in a sense we are giving welfare to the Wall Street banks. Because of their size, they are getting advantage on the capital markets because investors, with their dollars, understand these banks are never going to be able to fail unless we really keep them from getting too big. Explain that Wall Street welfare that we see with these 50 literally trillion-dollar-plus banks, which they extract from the system.”