[msandford]

Break them up then. Not directly, but indirectly by changing the incentives to be big. Also define a "bank" semi-recursively so even a company which merely owns 20 banks (or a company which owns a company which owns a bank, etc) is still considered a bank for the purposes of these laws.

Banks with holdings of over 0.5% of GDP lose all FDIC protection, while still paying.

Banks with holdings over 1% pay quadruple FDIC premiums while still receiving no coverage.

Banks over 2% also pay double-tax on every tax they pay either directly or indirectly, so all the payroll taxes are doubled and so are corporate profit taxes.

Banks over 3% pay all above but instead of double taxes, quadruple taxes.

Banks over 5% pay everything and get taxed at 5% of assets per year.

Very smart folks would immediately start figuring out how to fairly cleanly break the banks up while simultaneously not destroying themselves or the entire economy. Why? Because there'd BE MONEY IN IT.