With the recent publication of its final rule, the federal government's Financial Stability Oversight Council is now in position to designate certain nonbank firms as "systemically important financial institutions" (SIFIs). There is probably no aspect of the Dodd-Frank Act that will have more damaging effects on competition in the U.S. financial system.

On the heel of the recent JP Morgan fiasco, American Enterprise Economist John Makin makes the case for how Dodd-Frank is an insufficient guarantor of financial stability.

Under the Dodd-Frank financial-reform law, large nonbank firms may be declared systemically important because their failure will cause a systemic breakdown. In effect, this amounts to a government statement that these firms are too big to fail.

The $2 billion loss by JPMorgan Chase has reawakened debate about whether banks are taking excessive risks, but many facts have gotten lost in the breathless media coverage.

It’s depressing to watch, but it is missing the point that the Volcker rule would not have prevented the loss and is probably unworkable.

The underlying idea—that financial institutions are "interconnected" and the failure of one will drag down others - is not implausible. But like so much else that underlies the Dodd-Frank Act, it was accepted as true—and acted upon—without much evidence, or even much thought.

The financial crisis was not caused by the disorderly bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers, but by a common shock to all firms: the decline in mortgage values after the housing bubble collapsed, exacerbated by mark-to-market accounting.

What are the specific problems and issues with the mortgage regulations resulting from the Dodd-Frank Act? How can we strike the right balance between risk and recovery?