Please don't make me have to care about the FDIC
The U.S. agency that tries to prevent financial meltdowns is crucially important. But it should be very boring.
As a longtime business reporter, I’m paid to care about a lot of things that can easily seem boring. Most are actually fascinating once you dig into them … and sometimes they’re even fun.
But then there are the topics I never want to have to care about. They’re boring by design. And if we have to pay attention to them … Something Has Gone Horribly Wrong.
Anyway, this is what I worked on last week:
Since its creation 92 years ago, during a national panic that closed thousands of banks, the FDIC has performed some of the unglamorous but crucial work of ensuring financial stability. Its very existence reassures consumers and businesses that their money is safe, by insuring deposits of up to $250,000.
And its employees closely monitor most of the United States' smaller banks. …The end goal of these examinations is to catch any problems before they snowball into a bank failure — or a wider banking crisis. In those worst-case scenarios, the FDIC is also responsible for taking over failed banks.
If all is going well, the FDIC should remain happily behind-the-scenes, quietly holding up our financial system. But if it starts making headlines … it’s pretty bad, for all of us.
Back in 2008, when banks were failing almost every weekend and the economy was plummeting into the Great Recession, the FDIC even had a moment of mainstream consumer celebrity: 60 Minutes and This American Life sent reporters on ride-alongs, to explain how this boring and incredibly important agency was trying to keep financial panic from spreading.
Those features got dusted off and re-circulated two years ago, as the FDIC worked to contain the (thankfully, ultimately much smaller) regional banking crisis that started with the failure of Silicon Valley Bank.
I’d even argue that, when it comes to FDIC headlines, the best-case scenario is that reporters uncover a massive internal scandal involving strip clubs, sexting bosses, and rampant workplace harassment … because as deeply unpleasant as that sounds for everyone who works there, it doesn’t have immediate ramifications for the whole U.S. economy.
But this is where we are now:
The agency has been struggling with several internal problems, including staffing shortages and widespread employee complaints about a toxic culture. The FDIC says that its staffing problems have already made it harder to adequately supervise banks and reduce the risk of bank failures.
Now, those problems are getting much worse. [President] Trump and his billionaire adviser, Elon Musk, are firing workers across agencies as they slash the size of the federal government — and hundreds of FDIC employees have already been affected.
…"This administration is really sowing the seeds for the next financial crisis," says Mayra Rodríguez Valladares, a financial risk consultant who works with banks and regulators.
…"That is just literally one of the most dangerous, one of the most insane things I've ever seen, and I've been working in markets for over three decades.”
Look, I know that 2025 so far has been an ongoing exercise in having to worry about things we’ve spent decades comfortably ignoring: Measles. Nuclear safety. A dumb internet joke about a dog.
But as somebody who already lived through one huge financial crisis — and had to spend a lot of my early career actively paying attention to crucial and usually-boring banking regulators — I’m begging the universe: Please, please, please don’t make me have to care again about the FDIC.
Lady Bits
Theater rec: Liberation takes a story that could be super-preachy (1970s women learn about feminism!) and turns it into something deft, funny, and thoughtful about mothers, daughters, white feminism, and the stories women tell about each other.
Also, the opening joke about the show’s runtime, and how a woman with children would never write a six- or eight-hour play? Somewhere Tony Kushner is wincing.