But is this really such a bad thing [if banks game the PPIP]? It sounds a lot like a good bank/bad bank model, in which we recapitalize Citibank to the tune of $925,000 and take the toxic asset off its books and stick it in another entity--a "bad bank"--created for that purpose. As I've said before, there may be moral objections to such an arrangement. (It is offensive that taxpayers have to bail Citibank out.) And the Geithner plan may not have enough money to recapitalize all the banks this way. But that's different from arguing that it can't work....What's a few trillion dollars between friends? But Scheiber ignores the very real possibility that the PPIP will not be enough - that bank losses will go well beyond the funding Geithner can manufacture with the FDIC and the Fed, and that the administration will have to go back to Congress. In that case, if the entire bailout process is perceived as an indefensible giveaway to Wall Street, then there is little hope of convincing Congress to pony up for more. If that happens we could be back where we were last September - financial panic as too-big-to-fail institutions fail.
The only real difference, so far as I can tell, is who pays. Under Sachs's preferred approach, the bondholders and stockholders take most of the hit, while under his hypothetical gaming approach, the taxpayers do. Again, that's not fair. But being unfair doesn't doom something to fail. And I'd take an unfair success over a fair failure. (Though successful and fair would be ideal, and Sachs's proposal may get us close.)
Therefore, there is a premium on finding a policy that not only will work, but the public will see as being fair. Geithner seems to understand this, which is likely why he has resurrected the Paulson cash-for-trash plan with a few bells and whistles to distract the public (like any good magician, Geithner knows misdirection is key). But rather than trying to trick the public, wouldn't a much simpler plan that put insolvent banks into some form of receivership-on-steroids and restructured them make more sense? This would not only be good policy, but good politics as well; Axelrod and Emmanuel certainly understand that getting tough on Wall Street would be a popular position.
These are issues that Scheiber completely ignores. He seems to have completely bought the administration/banks' line that we must save the bankers to save the economy. But saving the banks does not mean saving the bankers who got us in this mess. Oops - I guess that makes me a radical populist.
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