AMERICAN GOVERNMENT AND BUSINESS:
RAILROADS, TRUCKS, AIRLINES AND BANKS SINCE 1945

Mark Rose

Lifelong Learning Society Distinguished Professorship in Arts and Humanities, 2012-2013

DESCRIPTION: In April 2012, Richard D. Parsons stepped down as Chair of Citigroup. According to him, bank deregulation was one of the major reasons for the 2008 financial crisis. Up to the 1960s, federal and state laws placed sharp restraints on the types of loans that bankers could make. Similar restrictions limited the actions that rail, air and truck executives could undertake with regard to price and service. Between the 1970s and the late 1990s, lawmakers and regulators eliminated many of those price and service restrictions. Parsons contends that these changes were not “deregulation.” Business historians say that the state created the market, rather than the other way around.

BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION: Mark Rose is Professor of History at Florida Atlantic University (FAU), and also co-edits a book series, American Business, Politics, and Society, published by the University of Pennsylvania Press. He recently was awarded an honorary stipend for his scholarship by the Lifelong Learning Society (LLS) in Boca Raton. The stipend will be used to do research on urban history and business.