BMO Professor vs. Bank Regulation

Last week, the C. D. Howe Institute was out with an op-ed contending that Canadian household debt is not worth worrying too much about: “There does not seem to be a strong case for restrictive regulation of consumer credit products, such as tight caps on interest rates.”

The C. D. Howe Institute arguing for looser financial regulation is nothing new. On the eve of the global financial crisis, it released a paper presenting more securitization as the antidote to financial risk.

But Andrew Hepburn draws my attention to the byline under last week’s op-ed: “Jim MacGee is a Bank of Montreal Professor and Associate Professor of Economics at the University of Western Ontario.”

So, the Bank of Montreal Professor does not want stronger consumer-credit regulations applied to banks. What’s next? The Enbridge Professor endorsing the Northern Gateway pipeline?

2 comments

  • Nice catch. I have to get out of the university game. It is so atrociously bought and paid for. Although I wonder if this direct funding model will have the same pay-off when such titles make it transparently clear who is buying the research.

  • You should see paper co-author Thorsten V. Koeppl’s frustratingly naieve comments during this airing of TVO’s The Agenda http://theagenda.tvo.org/economics-uncertain-times
    I thought Perry Mehrling and David Laidler made the best points about current orthodoxy and the need to learn from history.

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