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Full-Text Articles in Law

Derivatives: A Twenty-First Century Understanding, Timothy E. Lynch Oct 2011

Derivatives: A Twenty-First Century Understanding, Timothy E. Lynch

Faculty Works

Derivatives are commonly defined as some variation of the following: a financial instrument whose value is derived from the performance of a secondary source such as an underlying bond, commodity or index. But this definition is both over-inclusive and under-inclusive. Thus, not surprisingly, derivatives are largely misunderstood, including by many policy makers, regulators and legal analysts. It is important for interested parties such as policy makers to understand derivatives, because the types and uses of derivatives have exploded in the last few decades, and because these financial instruments can provide both social benefits and cause social harms. This Article presents …


Review Of Seeds Of Destruction: Why The Path To Economic Ruin Runs Through Washington, And How To Reclaim American Prosperity, Michael S. Barr Jan 2011

Review Of Seeds Of Destruction: Why The Path To Economic Ruin Runs Through Washington, And How To Reclaim American Prosperity, Michael S. Barr

Reviews

The United States has just gone through the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression. Our financial system came to brink of collapse, saved only by a massive intervention by the federal government. Although officially the Great Recession is now over, high unemployment and slow growth persist. Deficits that were ballooning in the 2000s with the weight of tax cuts, increased health care expenditures, and defense spending related to Iraq and Afghanistan, even before the financial crisis, have continued to climb, as lower tax receipts, automatic stabilizers, and fiscal stimulus kicked into gear.


Ability To Pay, John A. E. Pottow Jan 2011

Ability To Pay, John A. E. Pottow

Articles

The landmark Dodd-Frank Act of 2010 ("Dodd-Frank") transforms the regulation of consumer credit in the United States. Many of its changes have been high-profile, attracting considerable media and scholarly attention, most notably the establishment of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau ("CFPB"). Even specific consumer reforms, such as a so-called "plain vanilla" proposal, drew hot debate and lobbying firepower. But when the dust settled, one profoundly transformative innovation that did not garner the same outrage as plain vanilla or the CFPB did get into the law: imposing upon lenders a duty to assure a borrower's ability to repay. Ensuring a borrower's …