Peter Wallison Presents “Hidden in Plain Sight: What Really Caused the World’s Worst Financial Crisis” on April 12^th at Dartmouth College

Author, lawyer and American Enterprise Institute (AEI) scholar Peter Wallison will present “Hidden in Plain Sight: What Really Caused the World’s Worst Financial Crisis” for Dartmouth College's Political Economy Project at 4:00 pm on Tuesday April 12^th in Rockefeller 001. The lecture is free and open to the public and press.

Peter J. Wallison holds the Arthur F. Burns Chair in financial policy studies and is co-director of AEI’s program on financial policy studies. While at Dartmouth, Mr. Wallison will discuss his book Hidden in Plain Sight: What Really Caused the World’s Worst Financial Crisis.  Mr. Wallison’s book contests the conventional narrative that the 2008 financial crisis was caused by Wall Street greed and insufficient regulation of the financial system and suggests that there is evidence that financial regulations like the Dodd-Frank Act have, in fact, slowed the economy’s recovery.

Mr. Wallison offers a competing narrative about what caused the financial crisis, contending that the crisis was caused by government housing policies. Wallison explains that in June 2008, before the crisis, 56 percent of all mortgages in the United States were subprime or otherwise low-quality. Of these, 76 percent were on the books of government agencies such as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. When these mortgages defaulted in 2007 and 2008, they drove down housing prices and weakened banks and other mortgage holders, causing the crisis.

No one will be able to claim the financial crisis was caused by insufficient regulation, or defend Dodd-Frank, without coming to terms with the data this book contains.

Prior to joining AEI, Mr. Wallison practiced banking, corporate, and financial law at Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher in Washington, DC and New York. Wallison has held a number of government positions. From June 1981 to January 1985, he was general counsel of the U.S. Treasury Department, where he had a significant role in the development of the Reagan administration’s proposals for deregulation in the financial services industry. During 1986 and 1987, Wallison was White House counsel to Reagan, and between 1972 and 1976, he served first as special assistant to New York Gov. Nelson A. Rockefeller and subsequently as counsel to Rockefeller when he served as vice president of the United States.

Wallison is licensed to practice before the courts of New York and the District of Columbia, and he is a member of the District of Columbia Bar Association. He received his undergraduate degree from Harvard College in 1963 and law degree from Harvard Law School in 1966.