July marks the 10th anniversary of the Dodd-Frank Act, which includes the controversial Durbin Amendment—a policy that has done nothing but harm consumers and financial institutions since its inception.
Congress passed the Durbin Amendment based on assertions that lowering debit card interchange fees—small charges merchants pay banks when a customer makes a purchase through a debit card—would allow merchants to lower prices for consumers while at the same time not harming credit unions and community institutions. The payment card market, however, like the popular reservation platform Open Table, is a two-sided market with two sets of customers: consumers and businesses. Government cannot intervene on behalf of one group of customers without taking away from the rest.