to wuf: faultlines and the rich, obama's failings

[IowaSkinsFan]

To semi-wade into this, the right wing libertarian argument that all government regulation is bad is bogus. To use the Canadian mortgage and banking sector as an example, Canada suffered far less and rode out/is riding out the recession far, far better than the USA precisely because our mortgage lenders/banks are more tightly regulated. It's a structural difference that prevented our banks from taking the massive risks with other people's money that the US financial sector did, resulting in the US housing bubble and the sub-prime mortgage debacle. And, yes, we still have our AAA credit rating.

Read some Matt Tiabbi Rolling Stone Politics | Taibblog | Matt Taibbi on Politics and the Economy if you really want to get into the weeds on this.

Also:

‪Quantitative Easing Explained‬‏ - YouTube

and...

It's the Economy, Dummkopf! | Business | Vanity Fair

I believe this point was brought up before. Certainly canandian regulations were better than US regulations. But its just that, the US mortgage regulations led to bad lending. What would be interesting to see is if canandian banks tried to lend as loosely as possible or were actually lending tighter than the regulatory standards. If it was the latter, the regulation did nothing.

CA regs better than US regs does not mean CA refs better than no regs

[CoccoBill]

What would be interesting to see is if canandian banks tried to lend as loosely as possible or were actually lending tighter than the regulatory standards. If it was the latter, the regulation did nothing.

If lending tighter (with smaller risk) demonstrably leads to a better outcome, isn't regulation that enforces that behaviour always good? What any individual banks chose to do is circumstantial and may have had nothing to do with regulation.