Emmer: Five Years of Dodd-Frank, Five Years of Failures

Statement

Today marks the 5th Anniversary since Dodd-Frank was signed into law. In honor of the 5th anniversary, I spoke on the House Floor to voice my opposition to the burdensome regulations Dodd-Frank has placed on the financial industry.

My remarks were as follows:

Mr. Speaker,

I rise today -- on the 5th Anniversary of Dodd-Frank-- to share a story from a small community bank that has three locations in my district. This bank is struggling due to the additional regulation that Dodd-Frank imposed on them.

They were forced to hire a full time compliance director in addition to retaining two outside compliance firms. This has cost the bank nearly $100,000 more annually.

In addition, numerous other staff members now have to take time away from revenue generating activities to satisfy the compliance regulations created by Dodd-Frank.

They told me, "Compliance has always been a cost that is just a part of our business, however since Dodd Frank, this cost has expanded greatly. Unfortunately, since there is no offsetting revenue for this expanding cost, we are forced to consider passing on costs to our customers with additional fees."

Mr. Speaker, I wish I could say this is an isolated occurrence but a recent study shows that Dodd-Frank has added 61 million hours of paper work and more than $24 billion in final rule costs for the financial industry. Nationwide, we have lost approximately 1500 community banks already.

The five years since Dodd-Frank was signed into law have been marked with five years of failures.

Source