Over the years my viewpoints on the economy have certainly moved more toward the right but I do not think that I was ever one to support significant government regulation over anything (with the exception of course of police, roads, schools, etc.).  I diverge from my concern over "big government" when it comes to funding for the Justice Department Anti-Trust Division.  Given the choice I would be certain that this group is well-funded because, as we saw with AIG, anti-trust issues are the achilles heal of free enterprise. 

If a corporation becomes "too big to fail" and for whatever reason, it does fail, then, as we saw with AIG the government is forced to step in and save the day!  We cannot let this happen.  The Anti-Trust folks in the Justice Department must have enough clout to keep corporations from becoming too big, too essential to the overall economy.

Okay the concept of a bunch of bureaucrats making determinations like this scares me too, but I would rather error on keeping the AIGs of the world too big then paying out bailout money to keep them in business.

Remember......these are my views and are not necessarily the views of MIT, the MIT CFO Conference, etc.  But, of course, any logical person would agree with me here, right?

Happy to hear of any contrary viewpoints.............

David A. Fogel, CPA                                                                                                                                                                                           Coordinating Committee for the MIT Sloan CFO Summit

Principal, Swifton CFOs
Email: dfogel@swiftoncfos.com Twitter: @swifton