SMALL VICTORY….Last week Citigroup dropped its opposition to “cramdown” legislation that would allow bankruptcy judges to rewrite mortgage terms for distressed homeowners. Robert Reich thinks they probably did this because they knew they’d need some additional bailout money in the near future:
In other words, the Wall Street bailout has had exactly the same effect for Congress that the proposed bankruptcy provision would have for homeowners — it has increased its bargaining power over those who ordinarily pull the strings. The massive tax-payer financed bailout of Wall Street…seems to be weakening the Street’s ability to veto financial legislation it doesn’t like. I’m not sure whether this is something we should be celebrating as a small victory for democracy, or condemning as an extortionate price for reducing Wall Street’s grip.
I think “small victory” is probably the right way to look at it, with an emphasis on “small.” Sure, the price was high, but after all, nationalizing Citi and other big banks would be pretty expensive too. (Sweden’s bank nationalization in the early 90s probably resulted in direct costs of around 2% of GDP, equivalent to about $300 billion for the U.S.) Now let’s see if we can sqeeze a few somewhat larger victories out of all this.
