Pecora: A Look Back That Moved Us Forward

Nowadays only a handful of financial wonks know who Ferdinand Pecora was. Yet in the depths of the Great Depression this son of a Sicilian shoemaker made his mark on history by uncovering the wrongdoing that led to the 1929 market collapse. The findings from the congressional commission he led fostered the regulatory structures that rebuilt the market and lasted until conservatives all but dismantled it during the past decade. We need another Pecora Commission in order to right the wrongs of the markets and get the economy moving again.

Ferdinand Pecora was a tough-nosed, street smart prosecutor who had learned about corporate abuse taking down stock fraudsters and predatory lenders as a New York City Assistant District Attorney in the 1920s. He was hired as chief counsel for the Senate Banking Committee in 1933.