Congress is gearing up again to work on its financial reform bill. And just in time, there’s a new Associated Press poll out today about the cause of the crisis and the new rules that are being suggested.
80 percent of people blame the banks for the crisis.
70 percent blame the government. Fine. No surprise.
60 percent blame people who borrowed money that they couldn’t afford to repay, while less than a quarter blame President Barack Obama, though he came into office after the meltdown.
More interestingly, 64 percent say they think the new regulations Congress is debating won’t do anything to prevent another crisis. Which it won’t. There is going to be another financial meltdown someday. All the academics will tell you that.
The only question they have is how bad it’s going to be. And how — or whether — these rules are going to change that.
More findings from the poll:
Amid competing news, particularly the Gulf oil spill, only one-quarter of poll respondents said they were very closely or extremely closely following news about the Wall Street legislation.
Nearly two-thirds of those surveyed described their personal financial situation as good or leaning toward good — a growing trend over the past year. But 19 percent believed the economy had improved over the past month, down from the 25 percent who thought it had improved a month ago.
We will, of course, be covering the financial reform bill as it unfolds. You can follow all of our financial reform coverage here.
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