WASHINGTON — Consumers are likely to see their banks, credit unions and brokerages tightening interest rates and boosting fees as the federal government works to shore up its various industry-funded insurance programs, The Boston Globe reported today.

Several government insurance agencies that have charged low premiums to financial firms are now expected to start raising their rates in an effort to compensate for growing shortfalls caused by the recession, according to The Globe.

Agency officials say the increases in premiums are likely to be passed on to consumers in the form of increased interest rates on loans, lower interest rates on savings accounts and higher bank fees.

The Globe said the reason for the expected premium hikes is years of overly-low rates charged by the agencies during the past 10 years, during which lobbying groups have driven the premium increases down to nothing by appealing to Congress.

“This is what happens when you put the government in charge of an insurance program,” Jeffrey Brown, a finance professor at the University of Illinois, told The Globe. “They don’t run them the way they need to be run.”

Affected agencies include the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. and the National Credit Union Administration, both of which charged no premiums to most member banks over the past decade. Others include The Security Investor Protection Corp. and the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp., which insures the pensions of 44 million Americans and charges fees at a fraction of the market rate.

John McKechnie, spokesman for the National Credit Union Administration, told The Globe that it was not until recently that many of these issues were understood. “When the sun was shining, nobody wanted to pay more,” he said.

McKechnie also predicted that losses would be passed on to consumers in the form of lower interest rates to depositors with savings accounts.

Barney Frank, D-Fall River, chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, told reporters that Congress was convinced that there was enough money in the insurance funds when the rates were being set. Frank said Congress has found ways to redirect new fees, steering them away from consumers.

Some agencies have already begun to raise their fees.

The National Credit Union Administration has imposed fees of approximately 1 percent of insured deposits at member credit unions. The Security Investor Protection Corp. has raised its fees from a flat $150 annual charge to 0.25 percent of a brokerage firm’s net operating revenue, a move which could increase the annual charges at some brokerage firms by millions of dollars, according to The Globe.