ARNOLD KLING: The True Role of the Central Bank: Saving Big Banks. “In the 2008 financial crisis, what was the Fed’s main concern? I would say that the focus was on the health of the ‘primary dealers,’ the handful of large institutions that are most responsible for maintaining a market in U.S. government debt. The Fed may have failed to forestall a recession, but except for Lehman, all of the primary dealers survived.”