I will be on an Oxford Analytica conference call on the Greek crisis today from 4-5 pm BST. If a transcript can be made available, I will post one here. UPDATE 26/5/2010 No transcript available. The call went well, with expert analysis on the political situation in Greece and Spain, the economic outlook there, and […]
Monthly Archives: May 2010
A beginner’s guide to the Great Depression and the link to today
You might be surprised that the Great Depression (1929-33) was universal. You might also be surprised that in 1931 the title “Great Depression” was already taken. It belonged to the 1890-95 global recession. If you’d asked anyone in 1931, they’d tell you that was the Great Depression. Little did they realize they’d find a way […]
Investigative journalism
From Payback time: Padded pensions add to New York fiscal woes An online, searchable database compiled by The Times contains the names and pensions of about 3,700 public retirees in New York who receive more than $100,000 a year. In fact, the cost of public pensions has been systemically underestimated nationwide for more than two decades, say some […]
Q&A on “EMU as reprise of the gold standard”
A few more points on this topic…. eventually I’ll need to write about something else.From comments here and elsewhere I highlight the following: Greek/Club Med default will make European banks (German, French especially) insolvent.In other words, “the cure is worse than the disease”. There is an historical parallel. When Credit Anstalt imploded in Austria (May […]
Could summer 2010 reprise summer 1931?
In an earlier post I argued that Greece cannot grow within the EMU. It must default/ restructure and re-issue the drachma. The costs of exit are outweighed by the costs of staying on the euro. Markets have a short memory, and in fact Greece as a sovereign borrower will be more attractive post-default (because of a lighter […]
EMU and the gold standard
Defecting from EMU is being described as a horrible outcome — whether for Europe or for the benighted Greece et al is not always made clear. But the general tenor is that defection from EMU would constitute a shock which the world is in no condition to bear. We have been here before. In the […]
The great amnesia over the Great Depression
It’s amazing to me how reluctant people are to prescribe euro-exit. Eichengreen stops well short; quite the contrary, he portrays such a move as disastrous. (The technical issues (ATMs, etc) and legal issues (cross-border debt contracts) are daunting, and the political cost is even worse: second-tier status in the EU if not outright expulsion.) If I […]