This explanation for the economic crisis is not for the faint of heart because, if correct, it implies that the patient is far sicker than even the most pessimistic economists are telling us. In short, I am suggesting an Alternative Diagnosis. As the global financier George Soros put it: ‘For 25 years has been consuming more than we have been producing … living beyond our means.’” (1)īut is this as far as we need look to get to the root of the continuing global economic meltdown?Ī case can be made that dire events having to do with real estate, the derivatives markets, and the auto and airline industries were themselves merely symptoms of an even deeper, systemic dysfunction that spells the end of economic growth as we have known it. First, in many Western countries the boom was created on a pile of debt held by consumers, corporations and some governments. However, as we later learnt, the global boom was built in large part on a … house of cards. In it the world enjoyed an extraordinary boom…. It is hard to disagree with the words of Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, in his July 25 essay in the Sydney Morning Herald: “The roots of the crisis lie in the preceding decade of excess. Clearly, over the past few years, speculative bubbles in real estate and the financial industry were blown up to colossal dimensions, and their bursting was inevitable. ![]() The causal connections between subprime mortgage loans and the crises at Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, and Lehman Brothers have been thoroughly explored and are well known. To be sure: the Conventional Diagnosis is clearly at least partly right. If we don’t understand why the world’s industrial and financial metabolism is seizing up, we are unlikely to apply the right medicine and could end up making matters much worse than they would otherwise be. Something similar holds for our national and global economic infirmity. If it is correct, then the treatment for our economic malady might logically include heavy doses of bailout money for beleaguered financial institutions, mortgage lenders, and car companies better regulation of derivatives and futures markets and stimulus programs to jumpstart consumer spending.īut what if this diagnosis is fundamentally flawed? The metaphor needs no belaboring: we all know that tragedy can result from a doctor’s misreading of symptoms, mistaking one disease for another. economy and the larger global economy ailing? Among the mainstream media, world leaders, and America’s economists-in-chief (Treasury Secretary Geithner and Federal Reserve Chairman Bernanke) there is near-unanimity of opinion: these recent troubles are primarily due to a combination of bad real estate loans and poor regulation of financial derivatives. Add a collapse in real estate values and carnage in the automotive and airline industries and the picture looks grim indeed.īut why are both the U.S. The inescapable symptoms include declines in consumer spending and consumer confidence, together with a contraction of international trade and available credit. ![]() He can be found on the web at and Everyone agrees: our economy is sick. Richard is a Senior Fellow of the Post Carbon Institute and author of five books on resource depletion and societal responses to the energy problem. This is a guest post by Richard Heinberg.
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