When regulation hurts the little guy

WHILE much praise has been heaped upon former US president Barack Obama's legacy, one unfortunate aspect of his presidency was the belief that everything could be solved by passing incredibly complex regulation.

The Dodd-Frank financial regulation bill, signed into law in 2010, has been particularly contentious. Characterising it as a confused and bloated law, The Economist opined that it was "too big not to fail".

Indeed one of the campaign pledges of Donald Trump was to scrap Dodd-Frank, saying that rather than reining in banking excesses, it made Wall Street an even bigger threat to America's economy and working families.