As I continue to see the big banks and the small banks go after each other about who should pay a larger premium to the FDIC, I thought of a poll question. Feel free to take the LinkedIn poll, but so far there are some pretty interesting trends.
The question: Who in your opinion is responsible for STARTING the US financial crisis?
The results (so far):
1st: Large Banks
2nd: Government Policy
3rd: Investment Firms
4th: Consumer Behavior
5th: Small Banks (no votes)
What is interesting here is that nobody feels that the small banks are responsible for this crisis, yet there is no doubt that they are feeling the brunt of things. As we witnessed this weekend, two more failed institutions has pushed up the meter of failed institutions to 36. All of these institutions have been relatively small banks (less than $10B), yet it is taking a toll on the insurance fund. Large banks have certainly been vilified in the media and on Wall Street, yet was it a matter of greed, bad decision making, overly complex business models, or something else that has created this image of large banks?
Government policy ranked second in the poll, and for good reason. Perhaps as we have found out, our economy is not necessarily better off when a magical number of home owners has been met. Artificially growing home ownership to meet has in fact been our biggest downfall – and who is to blame for that? Government policy, banks, investment firms or consumer behavior – or a combination? While looking behind us is like runway behind an airplane, it allows us to determine what needs to be done to avoid things like this in the future. Let your voice be heard, and post your thoughts on our Community.
