There sure is a lot of talk lately about business regulation that is needed in financial markets, but one also needs to remember that much of the problems we see today are actually the cause and effect of previous regulations.
Over regulation by government is almost always a bad idea, throw in a little politics and anything can happen.
Regulation in business is a tricky subject those who do not understand often call for huge amounts of regulation and so does the consumer, unfortunately, adding more regulations generally births the law of unintended consequences down the road, worsening a situation somewhere else.
But, do not take it from me, rather I'd like to recommend a very good book for your read: "The Future of Business Regulation; Private Action and Public Demand" by Murray L.
Weidenbaum; (American Management Association Edition).
Amacom, New York, NY; 1979 The book warns of the problems of government encroachment on the business sector, today we see he was absolutely right on the money.
He cites the many growing government interventions in the 1970s and impacts in that era.
We see now that things have gotten worse, much worse, American Business is over regulated to death.
The author gives both a pessimistic and optimistic outlook for the future, we see in hindsight we have indeed had a little of both.
This book to me is a good balance of Smoot's book "The Business Side of Government" and although this book is not perfect it is very interesting indeed.
The author does comment on the difference between stability and shock.
Less than a decade later we noted the shock in 1987, another in 2001 and we are living through one right now.