Paul Krugman
"The story of how we failed to see this coming has a clear policy implication — that financial market reform should be pressed quickly, and that it should not wait until the crisis is resolved"
More than any other prominent commentator, Krugman, who will soon accept the Nobel Prize for Economics, has the right to say he saw it coming and that it would be a deep crisis when the housing bubble burst. In today's column he finally says `I told you so': "what do you mean when you say `we', whiteman?" he said a few months back to a room full of economists, etc. Here it is.
When the Nobel Committee announced the award back in October I posted kudos on the nyTimes.com site - HERE.
1 comment:
Greenspan, et al didn't want to see it, they wanted to affirm their non-regulatory postures....
Many say the Secretary of the Treasury to be - Timothy Geithner - saw it coming a few years ago and spoke up too - though not all agree. His speech in Hong Kong is most often cited by both sides http://www.bis.org/review/r060918b.pdf
His conclusion sums up his speech fairly well. He saw the potential for the crisis and the causative factors pretty clearly but - unlike Krugman - did not call for regulatory action with any urgency.
I'm hoping Krugman becomes a member of the Economic Advisory Board that Volcker will head.
Post a Comment