This summer I got the amazing opportunity to work with Professor Conti-Brown, of Wharton’s Legal Studies Department, to research the history of financial regulation. I focused specifically on the Great Depression period and how government officials, agencies, and the private sector interacted in order to try and reverse the persistent downward economic spiral. In order to gain an in-depth understanding of the political climate at the time and the process that was taken to spur economic growth and create social safety nets, I studied the years of 1928 to 1935 directly from archived newspaper articles and other primary sources. I identified trends and key events in the archives and synthesized them into research memos that chronologically detailed events relating to banking regulation and its effects during the time period that were used to help Professor Conti-Brown write his book on the history of financial regulation.

By understanding the day to day actions of the government and influential private sector actors, I learned that the process of getting out of the recession was not linear, but rather a series of small positive and negative steps that took years to get the country to the point of uninterrupted economic process. This also helped me understand the larger picture: how macroeconomic trends affected banking regulation and consumer behavior. Studying the history of the Fed and banking regulation helped me understand crucial organizational changes that have happened in US banking regulation, like the restructuring of The Federal Reserve system and the creation of The FDIC, and how the changes in structure, mandate, and the creation of new organizations has altered the way banking regulation is approached in the US.

Understanding the role and development of banking regulation during the Great Depression has helped me see parallels to the current economic situation that I have not seen widely discussed in mainstream media. The work that I did with Professor Conti-Brown for his Oral History of Banking Regulation project helped me contrast the current approach to regulation with historical approaches and understand how they have developed over the years. I strongly believe that the ability to understand past strengths and shortcomings of responses to recessions are key to handling future crises in an informed manor that doesn’t repeat the mistakes of past generations; this research position helped me building a foundation that will hopefully allow me to expand on the work that I have done this summer and draw parallels between past and present financial regulation policies.