Do you know which part of our over-regulating federal government which all good Republicans keep trying drown in a bathtub suddenly just found itself with a large and growing tumor of staff hiring? FDA? Nope. EPA? Wrong again. USDA? Don’t make me laugh. FTC? Get real. Give up? Well, the part of the Big Bad Welfare State Federal Government that suddenly started experiencing rapid growth is right here:
The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp plans to hire as many as 138 new workers to address the potential for rising bank failures, the Wall Street Journal said in its March 26 edition.
An agency spokesman said the FDIC plans to boost the number of workers in its Division of Resolutions & Receiverships to as many as 380 from the current 223, the newspaper said. […]
At year-end, the agency had put 76 FDIC-insured banks with $22.2 billion of assets on its “problem list,” up from 65 institutions with $18.5 billion of assets at the end of the third quarter.
Only five U.S. banks have failed since 2004, including two this year. Analysts have predicted the failure rate will grow as losses from soured mortgages and other loans mount, and as regulators crack down on lenders that take too much risk.
Gosh, that doesn’t sound good, does it. By my math that’s a 62% increase in the staffing of the FDIC unit responsible for failed and insolvent banks. I thought things were all just peachy. Why just a few days ago President Bush was saying this about our economy:
[W]e will see our economy strengthen as the year progresses.
And then a few days later he said this about the state of our financial institutions:
[O]ur financial institutions are strong and that our capital markets are functioning efficiently and effectively.
Sounds like someone at the FDIC doesn’t take you at your word Mr. President. Maybe they didn’t get the memo, eh? Or maybe you were lying your ass off when you talked about how wonderful our economy is. I lean toward the latter, myself. Don’t take it personally, but when a President like you, who in the past has shown a a genius for running his private business ventures into the ground, starts talking about how our current “troubles” are nothing to worry about, I tend not to believe a single thing that comes out of his mouth.
Update [2008-3-28 17:2:38 by Steven D]: The Federal Reserve is not listening to Bush, either.