So the FDIC is in trouble because banks didn't pay insurance premiums for a DECADE

[Fleshdancer]

Thanks for NOTHING Congress

:grr:

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2009/03/11/now_needy_fdic_collected_little_in_premiums/?page=full?ref=fp1

WASHINGTON - The federal agency that insures bank deposits, which is asking for emergency powers to borrow up to $500 billion to take over failed banks, is facing a potential major shortfall in part because it collected no insurance premiums from most banks from 1996 to 2006.

The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, which insures deposits up to $250,000, tried for years to get congressional authority to collect the premiums in case of a looming crisis. But Congress believed that the fund was so well-capitalized - and that bank failures were so infrequent - that there was no need to collect the premiums for a decade, according to banking officials and analysts.

[MrPerson]

1. The insurance co has enough money. I dont wanna pay either.

[Frustratedlady]

3. That's OK. They don't want to pay your claims, either.

[Fleshdancer]

5. It's good to be a bank, isn't it?

You don't have to pay insurance premiums, the execs make millions, and when you run your business into the ground, you'll receive a bailout while crying that Americans are too hard on corporations.

Congress actually bought into the "too big to fail" hype. Anyone who continues to believe this fairytale is too stupid to succeed.

[Hamlette]

9. We need to inscribe this in the halls of congress "The best way to rob a bank is to own one."

maybe that would cause them pause.

[Fleshdancer]

12. Now THAT is one hell of a quote

:applause:

[malletgirl02]

17. Quote from the Happy End

That quote reminds me of this quote from Kurt Weil's and Bertolt Brecht's musical the Happy End: "robbing a bank's no crime compared to owning one". So much of that play applies to today.

[truedelphi]

18. Unfortunately some of us who voted for Change

Understand this. The candidate who got our vote, not so much. <sigh>

[AndyA]

2. Send them a bill.

And be sure to tack on late payment interest, late fees, etc. And go in and mark it on their credit reports, too. That's what banks do to everyone else, it should be good enough for them as well.

F*ckin' Deadbeats.

[Hamlette]

7. except we will have to pay the bill

[AndyA]

10. No we take it out of the bank executive's hides.

They can sell EVERYTHING: the cars, the boats, the wife's furs, everything to pay us back.

If it's so important that their bank doesn't fail, it should be worth it to them to personally invest to ensure its success, right?

[annabanana]

16. BINGO!! Sometimes you just have to go where the money is..

Too bad we can't extract the tuition for "c-student Jr"'s Ivy League "education".

[Bolo Boffin]

4. Note the years 1996-2006

Note who was in control of Congress in those years.

Jesus H. Christ.

[MineralMan]

6. Jesus was in control of Congress?

Wow! I didn't know that...it must have pleased the wingers no end. :bounce:

[Hamlette]

8. Right you are! So this is Clinton's fault. Oh, no, maybe its Obama's fault.

can't wait to see how they make that argument

[BlooInBloo]

11. Current EATED bank graph....

[originalpckelly]

13. And that explains why the FDIC has less than 1% of the money it's liable for...

in its reserve fund. What it means is that instead of the banks reducing their profit margins by paying some of their deposits/reserves into the FDIC fund, they wanted to make more loans and make more MONEY/PROFIT!

I cannot believe their irresponsibility.

So now, we the people will get stuck paying for what the private banks should have been paying for.

Privatize the profits,
socialize the losses.

[Bolo Boffin]

14. And tucked away in here is a nice tidbit on why the executive branch has resisted nationalizing big

banks:

But if the FDIC suddenly had to take over a giant bank such as Citigroup or Bank of America, the fund would be drained "in a flash," said Cornelius Hurley, director of the Boston University law school's Morin Center for Banking and Financial Law.

No more FDIC protection, no more financial system altogether.

Thanks, Republican Congress!

[truedelphi]

20. I don't doubt your citation - but can you spell out who it came from?

Those of us who watched Illinois Continental fail in the early 1980's remember the well done news articles of that time - "If only four other banks the size of Continental of Illinois go under, the FDIC will be finished."

[Bolo Boffin]

22. It's from the OP article. n/t

[annabanana]

15. So now they'll pay up past due amounts with interest, right?

Whoops!.. That all got portioned out in staff bonuses.. YEARS ago....

[truedelphi]

19. Yep. Why pay for pesky things like real insurance when you can spends your money

On things like betting wheether or not the sub prime mortgage market will be a winner?

And when everything tanks, the people on the bottom of the food chain will pay.

[progressoid]

21. Correction: WE will pay up those past due amounts with interest. n/t