We have paid too little attention to the growing economic and political power of our largest firms, and this concern is not limited to the financial sector.

It’s politics, not economics, that made them behemoths.

The evidence shows that the supposed benefits from supersized banks' scale are outweighed by the risks of disaster they generate.

Proponents contend its major provisions--monitoring systemic risk, limiting bank proprietary trading (the ‘Volcker rule’), placing new regulations on derivatives, and protecting consumers--will help prevent another financial crisis. Detractors, including many Republicans and Wall Street executives, argue that the reforms will imperil future economic growth by over-constraining the financial system.

The Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Act is a delayed work-in-progress.

To reduce risks to the financial system by limiting banks’ ability to engage in certain risky activities and limiting conflicts of interest, to reinstate certain Glass-Steagall Act protections that were repealed by the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, and for other purposes.

Glass-Steagall targets one of five major issues that need to be addressed to buttress the banking system. It is designed to complement other reforms, some already enacted in the Dodd-Frank financial reform law, and others still to come.

As policymakers respond to FDIC Vice-Chairman Hoenig’s call for a ‘healthy debate’ about the ‘21st Century Glass-Steagall Act’ introduced by Senators Elizabeth Warren and John McCain, they need to start with an accurate understanding of just what the Glass-Steagall Act provided and how subjects covered by the new bill have already been treated by the Dodd-Frank Act.