Dael Norwood is a historian of American capitalism, who lives and works in Newark.
It’s 2025: Do you feel like you aren’t getting scammed enough? Are you tired of not being cheated, ripped off and defrauded?
Probably not. We’re drowning in spam calls, phishing emails and junk mail, all pitching shady deals. It seems like we’re under constant siege by an army of con artists — and they’re winning.
Most people would prefer that government stop these financial predators — not lead more wolves to the door.
Unfortunately, Congress has taken the side of the wolves. Led by Rep. Sarah McBride, D-Del., the House of Representatives just unanimously passed the Equal Opportunity for All Investors Act of 2025. The bill smashes down guardrails that, for almost a century, kept Wall Street sharpers from picking the pockets of regular people. Together with the Trump administration’s rush to eradicate limits on private equity’s access to your retirement savings, this legislation sets the stage for a new financial crisis.
In a press release, Rep. McBride touts the bill as a popular victory. It makes “private markets,” previously accessible only to “millionaires,” available to “countless Americans.” The Delaware Black Chamber of Commerce, McBride says, told her this bill would “‘help close the capital gap for diverse business owners.’”
These claims are misleading. They misstate why Americans developed financial transparency regulations in the first place. And worse, they traffic in the same false promises of democratic opportunity that led to financial crashes in 1929 and 2008 — and all the human suffering that followed.
This bill doesn’t provide Americans an equal seat at the table, regardless of wealth — it shunts them off to a high chair facing the casino’s worst-paying slot machine.
In simple terms, the bill allows high-flying financial firms — private equity vultures, venture capitalist schemers and hedge fund sharks — to bypass standard transparency disclosures and market their high-risk investments, off the books, to folks without access to that critical information. Under current law, these kinds of “private offerings” are limited to “accredited investors” — financial institutions and individuals with huge reserves of capital that guarantee them access to “sophisticated” (really, “insider”) information.
Under the new bill, potential investors need only pass an exam about basic financial concepts to become “accredited.” Then, it’s open season — disclosures optional.
The rules limiting access to “private offerings” were put in place during the Great Depression. Amid the smoking wreckage of a financial system blown up by scams, U.S. lawmakers tried to create rules that would keep brokers honest. The Securities Act of 1933 required those selling securities to the public to disclose all information that a reasonable person would need to make an informed choice. Issuers had to provide potential buyers with full details — including accurate financial statements. Together with the rules and guidance issued by a new agency, the Securities and Exchange Commission, New Dealers put the U.S. financial system back together again but, this time, running on transparency instead of snake oil.
From the start, the new rules had exceptions. Sales to large firms and very wealthy individuals were exempt from registration and disclosure requirements. As one of the drafters of the 1933 act put it, these deals were “not a matter of concern to the federal government.” Even if they went bad, the logic ran, the damage would be contained — limited to “accredited investors.”
In detonating these firewalls, McBride’s bill doesn’t offer a way to close wealth gaps — it cracks them open wider. The key is information. Private offerings reward those who have deep pools of capital and, thus, the latest and most profitable information. That’s how the rich get richer at exponential rates: They have the means to bet big and move first when they receive advantageous info that other people — however well versed in general financial knowledge — lack.
The bill’s supporters also echo the misleading rhetoric that propelled the last great financial disaster. In the early 2000s, Countrywide Financial CEO Angelo Mozilo justified pushing unaffordable subprime mortgage loans as a social good — a profitable way to help victims of historical discrimination. He was wrong, and millions of Americans lost their homes. Now, Rep. McBride and her allies claim that eliminating investor protections will aid “underserved entrepreneurs” who have faced “systemic barriers.”
Same song, new verse.
Today, big financial firms are hunting desperately for new sources of capital to cover their losses and meet the new expenses of higher interest rates. They are hungrily eyeing Americans’ untapped savings for their next meals. This bill serves up Americans eager for financial stability on a platter — but seeks to convince the folks being made the main course that they’ll get a bite to eat, too. They won’t.
Americans deserve an equitable financial system and real democratic solutions to economic inequality — not a cleverly titled dinner invitation for a con artist army.
Reader reactions, pro or con, are welcomed at civiltalk@iniusa.org.
