On Feb. 5, I had the pleasure of addressing the annual conference of the Receivables Management Association International in Las Vegas. Below is a transcript of my speech. ***** Thank you for the opportunity to address you this morning. It has become so easy to borrow in…
The Community Reinvestment Act is supposed to ensure that banks lend to low- and moderate-income households wherever they operate. But there are reasons to doubt its effectiveness. In the Washington Post this summer, I reported findings (from a forthcoming paper with Andrew Forrester) that more than two-thirds…
On October 21, I had the pleasure to give the research keynote address at the annual conference of the Financial Services Centers of America (FiSCA) in Miami. Below are my remarks, in which I critique some policymakers' attempts to promote financial inclusion by restricting consumer choice and…
The French finance minister, Bruno Le Maire, delivered a scathing rebuke to Libra, the Facebook-led digital currency initiative, in the Financial Times this morning. Coming on the heels of several U.S. companies' withdrawal from the initiative after they received threatening letters from Senators Sherrod Brown and Brian…
Last week was a significant one for housing finance policy, as the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau gathered input on how to reform the underwriting rules that mortgage lenders must follow. With $15 trillion of mortgage debt outstanding, this is a subject of great economic significance for the…