With all the new laws and regulations since the financial crisis, it would be easy to believe that the banking industry is safer. Unfortunately, speakers at the Federal Reserve conference at George Washington University on Friday offered a range of reasons for why that’s not the case.

First, the regulatory framework remains fragmented. Not only do we have “a dual state and federal banking charter system,” as former Representative Barney Frank told the audience of regulators, bankers, lobbyists, consultants and academics, we also have three national bank regulators, 50 state bank regulators and two derivatives regulators, not to mention different regulators for securities, broker-dealers and insurance companies. Private equity and hedge funds remain largely unregulated. It is unreasonable to expect that all these entities would communicate, not to mention work well together, to detect the next crisis.

In his keynote speech, the former Federal Reserve chairman, Paul A. Volcker, said that he continued to ask people “if they like our regulatory system — and cannot find anyone who does.” He said that he and his research group, the Volcker Alliance, “will propose that the U.S. regulatory framework be streamlined,” but added that the proposal was likely to meet significant resistance from both the regulatory agencies and politicians, who all have a stake in the current structure.

Lack of openness throughout the financial sector, not just in banking, was also a significant problem that led to the crisis and will continue to thwart regulators in years to come. “During the crisis, it was very difficult to get access to information,” said Coryann Stefansson, managing director at PricewaterhouseCoopers. “It is a myth that you can get everything from a bank.”