Stories
Slash Boxes
Comments

SoylentNews is people

Journal by khallow
I've ranted before about the ridiculous nature of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) a holdover from the Obama era.

It's primary gimmick is the following: it isn't dependent on funding from US Congress. At one time, it even used to be independent of the US Executive Branch until a court ruling in 2016 that the US President could fire the head of the agency.

A three-judge panel on the 5th Circuit Federal Court of Appeals ruled this week that the CFPB's structure is unconstitutional because Congress has no control over the agency's budget, which is funded entirely by the Federal Reserve. Under the terms of Dodd-Frank, the CFPB is entitled to receive a budget totaling up to 12 percent of the Federal Reserve's annual operating expenses, and the Federal Reserve is not allowed to refuse the CFPB's requests for funding.

Now, that funding model has been used to reverse a ruling by the CFPB as unconstitutional with the potential to put all its rulings since formation into question on the same constitutional basis.

Why it matters: The reasoning behind the ruling, if upheld, could potentially invalidate all the rules enacted by the CFPB over its 11-year existence — including regulations underpinning the U.S. mortgage system.

This is one of the big reasons I oppose the passing of bad law even when it serves a concrete good. It can take a long time to fix the massive problems that such law brings.

And note that a key argument by the court was that there was no precedent for the CFPB's unconstitutional structure. If there had been other agencies with similar setups, this could have been very hard to overturn. Similarly, the CFPB is a precedent for future breaking of the US Constitution along these lines. Without the ruling, there would have been a stronger case for future misdeeds of this sort.

 

Reply to: Nonsense

    (Score: 4, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday October 22 2022, @11:31AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday October 22 2022, @11:31AM (#1277839)

    And note that a key argument by the court was that there was no precedent for the CFPB's unconstitutional structure. If there had been other agencies with similar setups, this could have been very hard to overturn.

    That is simply not true. As noted by https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2022/10/20/23414311/cfpb-unconstitutional-fifth-circuit-supreme-court-trump-community-financial [vox.com]:

    This arrangement, where an agency has a continuous funding source regardless of what Congress decides to do in annual debates over federal spending, is particularly common among financial regulatory agencies. The Federal Reserve, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, the Federal Housing Finance Agency, the National Credit Union Administration, and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency are all financed outside of the annual appropriations process. So is the CFPB.

    Wilson’s opinion describes this funding structure as “double-insulated funding” because the CFPB’s money passes through two agencies that are not subject to annual appropriations, and he claims that this kind of funding structure is “unique.” He also deems this somewhat unusual funding structure to be problematic because none of the other agencies that are insulated from the annual appropriations process wield “enforcement or regulatory authority remotely comparable to the authority the [CFPB] may exercise throughout the economy.”

    That last statement is doubtful, given that one of the other agencies that are insulated from annual appropriations is the Federal Reserve itself, the agency that controls the US money supply and that has such extraordinary power over the global economy that markets rise and fall based on merely on investors’ conjectures about what the Federal Reserve might do in the future.

    In any event, the Constitution does not say that “double-insulated” agencies are unconstitutional. It also does not say that Congress must fund powerful agencies differently than it funds less powerful agencies. It only says that Congress must pass a law funding an agency before that agency may spend money to carry out its functions.

    You haven't provided anything to really show that this is a bad law. It's simply not true that Congress doesn't control the agency's budget. All Congress has to do is pass a law that amends their own 2010 law. The Constitution does not mandate that agencies be subject to the annual appropriations process. In fact, this exists because of laws passed by Congress such as the Budget and Accounting Act of 1921 and the Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974. Congress created the annual appropriations process and therefore they also have the right to carve out exceptions where agencies are funded through means outside of this process.

    The ruling is complete nonsense, and you've provided nothing of your own to indicate why this is actually a bad law.

Post Comment

Edit Comment You are not logged in. You can log in now using the convenient form below, or Create an Account, or post as Anonymous Coward.

Public Terminal

Anonymous Coward [ Create an Account ]

Use the Preview Button! Check those URLs!


Logged-in users aren't forced to preview their comments. Create an Account!

Allowed HTML
<b|i|p|br|a|ol|ul|li|dl|dt|dd|em|strong|tt|blockquote|div|ecode|quote|sup|sub|abbr|sarc|sarcasm|user|spoiler|del>

URLs
<URL:http://example.com/> will auto-link a URL

Important Stuff

  • Please try to keep posts on topic.
  • Try to reply to other people's comments instead of starting new threads.
  • Read other people's messages before posting your own to avoid simply duplicating what has already been said.
  • Use a clear subject that describes what your message is about.
  • Offtopic, Inflammatory, Inappropriate, Illegal, or Offensive comments might be moderated. (You can read everything, even moderated posts, by adjusting your threshold on the User Preferences Page)
  • If you want replies to your comments sent to you, consider logging in or creating an account.

If you are having a problem with accounts or comment posting, please yell for help.