Some readers like to demonize those who get in over there heads with debt as people who lived high on the hog and had their day of reckoning come upon them. This story, forwarded from a reader, shows the picture is more complicated. When I was young, savings of six months of living expenses was […]
Read more...By George Washington of Washington’s Blog. Financial insider and commentator Yves Smith wrote an essay last week entitled “MSM Reporting as Propaganda” arguing that the government has been using propaganda to make people think that things are getting better, no one is angry, and – therefore – no one should get upset: The message, quite […]
Read more...By Jonathan Mintz, the Commissioner of the New York City Department of Consumer Affairs, and Richard H. Neiman, the Superintendent of Banks for the State of New York: For over a year, most of us have agreed that reform of our financial regulatory system is essential to our future financial stability and economic growth. Yet […]
Read more...By George Washington of Washington’s Blog. In 2000, America was described as the sole remaining superpower – or even the world’s “hyperpower”. Now we’re in real trouble (at the very least, you have to admit that we’re losing power and wealth in comparison with China). How did it happen so fast? As everyone knows, the […]
Read more...I’m of two minds about taking up this theme, since stating what ought to be obvious but is nevertheless unpleasant and inconvenient is apt to get one branded as lunatic fringe. Access journalism has created what is in many respects a controlled press. And that matters because people are far more suggestible than most of […]
Read more...A fascinating and somewhat disturbing article at the New York Review of Books by Jerome Groopman looks at what counts for progress in medical diagnosis and finds it to be more of a mixed bag than most readers would assume. This won’t come as much of a surprise to those who know a bit about […]
Read more...Ed Harrison has an excellent post over on his Credit Writedowns blog, following up and elaborating on his “Greed is Not Good” post here yesterday. To whet your appetite, here it the beginning of “More on greed, regulation, Lehman and the financial industry“: In one of my latest posts I said “greed is not good.” […]
Read more...Quelle horreur, some smart people are starting to question whether banking serves a redeeming social function. Of course, in the abstract, it does. Banking (or more accurately, extending credit) is essential for commerce. But any essential support function, if it overpriced in relationship to its true value, becomes a drag on the productive economy. And […]
Read more...Deflation, anyone? One of the staples of Japan’s lost now two decades has been an unrelenting squeeze on worker wages and work conditions. New graduates used to get full time jobs. Now man are “freeters” in a sort of temp purgatory. And given how important social networks are in Japan, the lack of a real […]
Read more...The Wall Street Journal story, “The ‘Democratization of Credit’ Is Over — Now It’s Payback Time,” is a solid piece of reporting on how credit that was once offered liberally to lower income consumers has now left a very big hangover. It’s worse than with other income strata for an obvious reason, namely, low income […]
Read more...By Satyajit Das, derivatives expert and author of Traders, Guns, and Money. Tom Wolfe writing in Bonfire of the Vanities created the term – ‘Masters of the Universe’: “He considered himself part of the new era and the new breed, a Wall Street egalitarian, a Master of the Universe, who was only a respecter of […]
Read more...Submitted by Edward Harrison of Credit Writedowns. Let’s say I run a company. For the sake of argument, we’ll call it a shoe store in New York City. I am making $100,000 net per year now. But, I look around me and see huge opportunity for growth. So I go to my bank and ask […]
Read more...By Swedish Lex, an expert and advisor on EU regulatory and political affairs. The French Commission on the Measurement of Economic Performance and Social Progress presented its final Report written by Stiglitz and other leading economists at an event at la Sorbonne earlier today. The contents of Report is already being discussed widely but at […]
Read more...There is a not bad piece at the New York Times on the fates of various ex-Lehman employees a year after the collapse. The story vividly if unwittingly illustrates the old saying that fish rot from the head. The people profiled were all involved in mortgage securitization, either directly or indirectly. Most seem unable to […]
Read more...Reader Don B pointed out a generally top notch piece by Luigi Zingales at a new publication, National Affairs, on how the financial crisis may change attitudes towards what he calls “democratic capitalism”. Even though the article is thoughtful and well written, it does fall prey to a major bit of intellectual sloppiness that is […]
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