Title:
Financial Reform Law Aims to Change Some Ways of
Wall Street
Description: This is
a VOA Special English Economics Report.
See text below
Text:
On July twenty-first, President Obama signed into
law the Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection
Act. He said: "These reforms represent the strongest
consumer financial protections in history."
Together, the changes represent the biggest rewrite
of financial rules since the Great Depression. At
the heart of the two thousand three hundred pages in
the bill are promises to protect average Americans.
Congress agreed to create a Consumer Financial
Protection Bureau. But the Federal Reserve will pay
for it. The central bank will budget about five
hundred million dollars a year. Travis Plunkett is
legislative director of the Consumer Federation of
America, a consumer rights group. He says this new
independent office will have a lot of responsibility
-- and that is a good thing. The bureau will set
rules for the marketplace and enforce existing laws.
One goal is to keep home buyers from getting bigger
loans than they can pay for. But the bureau will not
have power over auto lenders or banks with assets of
less than ten billion dollars. Financial interests
spent millions of dollars fighting the bill. The
House of Representatives passed its version in
December. In July, the Senate voted final approval
with the aid of three Republican senators. House
Minority Leader John Boehner called the financial
reform bill "ill-conceived." He said: "I think it's
going to make credit harder for the American people
to get, clearly harder for businesses to get."But
President Obama says Wall Street took irresponsible
risks that threatened the financial system. Under
the new law, banks no longer can own or invest in
certain trading operations. The government has new
powers to seize failing financial companies. These
include businesses that, during the financial
crisis, were considered "too big to fail." And
President Obama says the law does something else. He
said: "Finally, because of this law, the American
people will never again be asked to foot the bill
for Wall Street's mistakes. There will be no more
tax-funded bailouts."Regulatory agencies will write
hundreds of new rules for banks and other financial
companies. This follows years of
deregulation.Opponents in Congress say they will try
to block some measures in the new law. But even if
those efforts fail, it is too soon to know just how
strong the new rules will be.And that's the VOA
Special English Economics Report.
Hi. I
personally reviewed this video and found it appropriate for
the news section of English Global Group. This
is a Voice of America video which covers an interesting
topic in Special English. I would appreciate some feedback from both
students and teachers about this video. You can comment in
the window below using any of a number of different services
including Facebook, Yahoo, AOL, and Hotmail.
To post a comment:
• Click "Comment using..." in
the window below
• Click your favorite service: Facebook, Yahoo, AOL, Hotmail
• Login to the service
• Click "Add a comment..."
• Post your comment in the window
Students: Please post a
comment stating what you found interesting about this video. You are
welcome to include links to your English study blogs and any
other materials you think might be useful for learning
English.
Teachers: Please post your
thoughts about this video. You are welcome to include links to
your sites, blogs, and any other materials you think might
be useful for learning English.
Hi. I
personally reviewed this video and found it appropriate for
the news section of English Global Group. This
is a Voice of America video which covers an interesting
topic in Special English. I would appreciate some feedback from both
students and teachers about this video. You can comment in
the window below using any of a number of different services
including Facebook, Yahoo, AOL, and Hotmail.
