<p><span>No one expects to fail. But the lessons from the 2008 financial crisis highlight how quickly contagion can spread between highly interconnected institutions, threatening the viability of firms. As the Special Inspector General for TARP (“SIGTARP”), I reported to Congress on the decisions made by the Government to save “too big to fail” Wall Street institutions. The theme that ran through our findings was a massive failure in planning, and shock from institutions and regulators caught unaware by dangerous interconnections across the financial system. The Government intervened with bailouts to avoid the chaos from disorderly bank failures that would hurt Main Street.</span></p>