Ben Bernanke Approach Quotations

Congress had made clear that it has affirmed the principle of keeping banking and commerce separate. This loophole ... circumvents that principle. If Congress wants to revisit banking and commerce, that's their prerogative but it doesn't seem a good approach to allow a loophole in which that distinction breaks down.

The role of liquidity in systemic events provides yet another reason why, in the future, a more system wide or macroprudential approach to regulation is needed.

The Fed needs an approach that consolidates the gains of the Greenspan years and ensures that those successful policies will continue - even if future Fed chairmen are less skillful or less committed to price stability than Mr. Greenspan has been.

Stronger regulation and supervision aimed at problems with underwriting practices and lenders' risk management would have been a more effective and surgical approach to constraining the housing bubble than a general increase in interest rates.

The movement toward a holistic approach to community development has been long in the making, but the housing crisis has motivated further progress.