Dirty rotten banks and credit unions

You may be one of the majority of Americans that cheers as congress finally begins to act on the consumer abuses committed by financial institutions. They are going after all of the excess profit areas of the banks:
• Congress passed the CardAct this past May to stop unfair practices such as increasing interest rates on credit cards even when the consumers were reliably paying their bill. They also added disclosures and longer notification periods for the consumer’s benefit.
• Congress is expected to pass legislation to limit overdraft charges. Many of the large banks have taken preemptive action to not charge on small purchases or to set a limit on the number of charges per day.
• Congress is looking at limiting interchange fees paid by merchants to process debit/credit card transactions.
• Congress is likely to set up a new agency to protect consumers from future versions of these activities from financial institutions
These actions are all intended to rein in abuses that most financial institutions benefited from. But here is the rub. Credit cards, overdraft protection and interchange fees became so lucrative that financial institutions (and non-banks) would offer low interest loans or high interest checking accounts to get your business, loss leaders so to speak. Most community banks and credit unions entered into these practices because they had to in order to stay competitive. Their core business had become loss leaders for others. Offering these services became necessary to stay afloat. Take away profit from overdraft protection and interchange fees today and most small and medium size financial institutions will lose money. Do we really need more troubled financial institutions? I agree they need to get back to the basic services they do well, but they need time. Hopefully congress will enact these measures in a way that ensures an orderly transition back to the business model back of basic banking.