Elizabeth Warren unveils plan to rein in Wall Street, big banks

July 18 (UPI) -- Democratic presidential hopeful Elizabeth Warren unveiled her vision Thursday for reining in Wall Street corruption, income inequality and private equity "vampires."

The Massachusetts senator and 2020 candidate has in the past opposed bank deregulation and demanded stricter rules for big banks and lenders.

"In the lead-up to the 2008 crisis, I rang the alarm bell as I saw the same tricks and traps emerging in mortgages," Warren said in her proposal. "After I proposed a new federal agency to protect consumers -- and President Obama signed that agency into law in 2010 -- I spent nearly a year setting up the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and helping write new rules to crack down on financial scams."

Warren said because many protections in the Glass-Steagall Act have been removed by the Trump administration, she's proposing a "21st century Glass-Steagall Act," new executive compensation rules for bankers and a reversal of financial deregulation.

"Washington showered big banks with favors -- no strings-attached bailouts, massive subsidies, sweeping deregulation, and special tax breaks," she wrote. "In the Trump era alone, regulators have rolled back the rules for most big banks, and Republicans have shoveled them billions in giveaways in their tax bill."

She argues that prosperity for banks and Wall Street doesn't always benefit average Americans.

"Wall Street's success hasn't helped the broader economy -- it's come at the expense of the rest of the economy," Warren said. "Wall Street is looting the economy and Washington is helping them do it."

The plan targets private equity firms Warren says are "bleeding the company dry and walking away enriched even as the company succumbs."

Warren noted that because a quarter of all U.S. households don't have adequate access to a simple bank account, she proposes "postal banking" -- in which services like checking and savings accounts are easily accessed online and at post offices.

"Wall Street has rigged the game in its favor -- and it's not working for the rest of us," she said. "Rather than giving Wall Street what it wants and hoping that its big profits somehow benefit the broader economy, we should recognize what the actual purpose of the financial sector is and rein in Wall Street so it starts working for the rest of the economy again."