Tag Archives | recession

Covering debt with the money supply.

By on March 10, 2012 in Economics, General Discussion

This is an extension of the post I just wrote on Greek debt, but seemed to deserve a space of it’s own. I would like to put forward a couple thoughts on expanding the money supply to repair balance sheets hurt by absorbing bad debts and debt forgiveness. It seems that I often argue for the [...]

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A funny thing about the Greek debt crisis.

By on March 10, 2012 in Economics, General Discussion

One thing I find odd about the continued angst over the Greek debt crisis is that so much worry is expended over what is a relatively small amount of money. First off what we are mainly concerned about is privately held debt, since central banks have the power to issue currency, now for Greece that [...]

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Time to exit the market?

By on March 6, 2012 in Economics, General Discussion

Whitney is a progressive http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/03/05/mom-and-pop-investors-call-it-quits/ and Stockman is a conservative http://www.businessinsider.com/david-stockman-youd-be-a-fool-to-hold-anything-but-cash-now-2012-3?nr_email_referer=1&utm_source=Triggermail&utm_medium=email&utm_term=Money%20Game%20Select&utm_campaign=MoneyGame%20Select%20Mondays%202012-03-06#ixzz1oFPz7jW but they’re both pretty much saying the same thing: the historic bull run in stocks, courtesy of Bernanke’s ZIRP and QE, is soon coming to an end, as the underlying economy hasn’t recovered. That’s also pretty much what I’ve been saying, too.     [...]

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Feldstein Is Almost Sounding Like Krugman These Days!

By on January 16, 2012 in Economics, International affairs, Politics

Under the Project Syndicate links to the left, I recommend reading Martin Feldstein: How To Create A Depression. [I could not link to it here.]   Mr. Feldstein is sounding almost like Paul Krugman these days! Caught me a bit off-guard!

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The real problem with the Fed’s actions after the crisis.

By on December 30, 2011 in Economics, Human Behavior, Politics

Even amongst the commentators here there doesn’t seem to be a great deal of disagreement over the fact that the Fed did work to avert another depression following the crisis. The Economist in one of its recent briefings stated, “The shock that hit the world economy in 2008 was on a par with that which launched [...]

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The Arab Spring and The Financial Crisis: The Common Thread

By on November 9, 2011 in Economics, Human Behavior, International affairs, Politics

This is in response to Diogene’s argument that the revolt against Gadhafi in Libya was somehow ‘manufactured’ by America. The May/June 2011 issue of ‘Foreign Affairs’ had a series of articles on the ‘The New Arab Revolt’, with subtitles of ‘What Just Happened’, ‘Why No One Saw It Coming’, ‘What It Means’, and ‘What Comes [...]

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This Time Is Different — Not!

By on October 9, 2011 in Politics

Ezra Klein has a great post on his Wonkbook blog examining the early policy decisions of the Obama administration as they responded to the crisis of the Great Recession and he asks the all important question of what, if anything could they have done different. I would encourage you all to read it; it’s an [...]

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A lost generation.

By on October 6, 2011 in General Discussion

Lately, a lot of pundits have been talking about the risk of a “lost decade,” economically.  But they’re late to the party on that one.  The decade has already been lost.  The only question is whether it’ll be two consecutive lost decades before things are back on track. Comparing where we are with where we were [...]

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Calculating the Probability of a FInancial Crisis

By on September 30, 2011 in Science

Interesting article from the Science Daily website: Financial Crisis: Calculating the Probability of Extreme Events ScienceDaily (Sep. 26, 2011) — It had to happen: the property bubble burst and the global financial market experienced its biggest crisis in the last hundred years. In retrospect, many suspected it was coming, but nobody could have known for [...]

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