Is the Fed Encouraging Credit Card Company Foot-Dragging?
A couple of financial follies follow-ups: On Tuesday, I wrote about how, in December, the Federal Reserve approved new rules curtailing some — but by no means all — of the more egregious practices of the credit card industry. But, surprisingly, the rules are not scheduled to go into effect until July 2010. Why, I wondered, this 18-month long delay before making the banks clean up their acts? Sen. Robert Menendez, one of the real leaders in the Congressional battle for credit card reform, had the same question. Looking for answers, he sent letters to the CEOs of the six biggest credit card issuers, urging them not to wait. “Because of the great danger facing our economy,” he wrote, “it is important that you institute the protections, as outlined in the recent regulations, as soon as possible.” Blogging on HuffPost, Sen. Menendez reports that five of the companies responded “and all but one claimed it was too much of a burden to do it any faster.” To hear the credit card companies tell
