Safe and sound banking twenty years later: what was proposed and what has been adopted

This article assesses the extent to which changes in public policy regarding depository institutions have aligned with the recommendations made twenty years ago in Perspectives on Safe and Sound Banking (Benston et al. 1986). Several legislative initiatives and bank regulatory and supervisory changes during the past two decades have been in keeping with Benston and his coauthors' recommendations and analyses. But other recommendations in the book have not been followed, and some proposals the book rejected have been enacted through legislation or regulation. ; The article focuses in turn on Benston et al.'s principal recommendations and then discusses and analyzes subsequent related legislative, regulatory, and supervisory developments.