“We are the United States of Amnesia; we learn nothing because we remember nothing,” Gore Vidal once said. That warning feels especially relevant in today’s financial landscape. In the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis—when excessive risk-taking led to widespread economic devastation—Congress passed the Dodd-Frank Act to restore fairness in financial markets. In doing so, it created the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) to serve as a dedicated watchdog for consumers of financial services. From its inception, the CFPB has performed a critical role in restoring balance between powerful financial institutions and the individuals who depend on them. Profits returned, but within a framework
designed to protect both consumers and the broader economy. Today, however, many of those safeguards are unraveling through a new wave of deregulation.

To understand the risks this poses, it is necessary to remember how regulatory failure enabled the last crisis. In the years leading up to 2008, financial institutions exploited gaps in oversight, shifting activity toward the least regulated parts of the market. Non-bank mortgage lenders and brokers thrived in this space, using lax standards and risky products to gain market share—eventually pulling even traditionally cautious banks into the same practices. In responding to the crisis, Congress, and subsequently the CFPB, ensured that strong and uniform regulation would create markets that were competitive for companies and fair to consumers. Yet recent policy decisions, especially around fintech, buy now pay later lending, and stablecoins, mark a return to uneven rules and regulatory blind spots. Once again, companies offering similar financial services are being treated differently under the law. And once again, short-term gains for a few are coming at the expense of long-term protections for many.