TIME FOR A TARP EXIT STRATEGY

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Shutting down the Troubled Asset Relief Program would ensure that we don't risk losing more taxpayer dollars

Our financial markets are no longer in free fall and the crisis has receded, so it is time to bring an end to the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) emergency measures and come up with an exit strategy to get government out of the business of running businesses.

The Treasury secretary has the authority to either allow the program to expire at the end of this year or extend it into next fall. Ending TARP this year is a vital first step to getting the federal government out of these expensive and risky entanglements in private industry:

• The latest report by the TARP Congressional Oversight Panel found that approximately $330 billion of the $700 billion limit is currently untapped.
• Allowing TARP to end this year and cancelling that remaining $330 billion would remove the inevitable temptation to spend it.
• With a budget shortfall expected to hit a record $1.6 trillion this year and a staggering $9 trillion over the next 10 years, we should be looking for every possible way to reduce the risk we are taking on behalf of taxpayers.

This dangerous mixture of politics and industry is bad for business, bad for the economy, and bad for the American taxpayer. TARP has run its course. The time for ending it is now.

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image toon - bdd mny TARP being used to cover bank's assets