Geithner Thanks TARP For Record-Low Interest Rates

by Miles Wolf Tamboli
Talk Radio News Service

Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner said Tuesday that due, in part, to the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), credit costs have plummeted, creating new opportunities for homeowners and small businesses.

"The financial system is in a much stronger position, and because of that, the cost of credit for homeowners, for consumers, for businesses has fallen significantly," Geithner said. "Rates for mortgages and auto loans, for example, are at historic lows."

Congressional Oversight Committee Chair Elizabeth Warren pressured Geithner to provide a "metric" for TARP's success in protecting American citizens from the mortgage crisis.

"You set aside $50 billion, and what do you have to show for it? What is the metric for success here," she questioned. "Is it 120,000 families saved over fifteen months, at a time when 186,000 are posted for new defaults and foreclosures every month? Is that a successful program? How do we decide when the program is working?"

Despite reassurances from the Treasury Secretary, lawmakers were left wondering in what ways to measure the success of Tarp before the program's expected termination in October.

"This hearing should be a eulogy for TARP. We are working very hard to put this program to rest," Geithner said. "It's not going to solve all the problems facing the country, it wasn't designed to, but it's done the essential thing it was designed to do and, therefore, our expectation is that it will be allowed to expire."

The Treasury Secretary also used the hearing as an opportunity to show his support for financial reform, which he sees as a chance to shift focus from crisis response to crisis prevention.

"The House and the Senate are now very close to enacting the strongest set of reforms we've considered as a country since the Great Depression," said Geithner. "The reforms will end 'Too Big To Fail' [and] non-bank financial firms, such as AIG, will no longer be allowed to exploit regulatory cracks."

Geithner said that the best thing Congress can do to tackle the remaining credit problems facing America is to pass the set of credit programs that benefit small businesses.