There Is No 'Easy Button' To Fix Financial Hole Nation Is Now In

A recent New York Times article addressed the fact that lenders - represented by the American Bankers Association, the Mortgage Bankers Association, and the Independent Community Bankers Association - have been lobbying hard to limit proposed rules that would curb certain lending practices and require greater disclosures. This should come as no surprise; we've seen it before. In the early years of the S&L crisis, more stringent rules were proposed by some regulatory agencies, and that industry lobbied long and hard to rein them in. A cornerstone of mortgage lenders' criticism of tighter standards now, at a time when credit is scarce and mortgage spreads are at their widest levels since before there was really much of a secondary mortgage market, is that tightening lending standards would make mortgages more expensive. To some degree, that's the entire point.