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The collapse of Lehman Brothers in September 2008 triggered fears that a Depression-like economic free fall was fast developing. To head it off, then-Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson helped arrange the Bank of America-Merrill Lynch merger and, a month later, pressured the nation's largest banks to take $125 billion of taxpayers' money. Featuring interviews with Bank of America CEO Kenneth Lewis and former Merrill Lynch CEO John Thain, Frontline: Breaking the Bank examines those goings-on through the prism of Bank of American and also explores the consequences of the infusion of public capital into the private sphere.