Tag Archives: This Time Is Different

Unfinished Business

Posted on November 13, 2012 by Maurice T. Cunningham

American campaigns are always about the size and role of government; it’s been this way since the days of Publius and The Federal Farmer. But campaigns often ignore topics the parties believe the populace might find unpleasant, especially if there is no benefit to either party in shining a light on the difficulties. So here are a few items that pose challenges to the nation, though you might not know it from the campaign.

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This Time Is Different, Again?

Posted on October 25, 2012 by Maurice T. Cunningham

I’ve been fascinated by the work of Carmen M. Reinhart and Kenneth Rogoff in their book This Time Is Different: Eight Centuries of Financial Follies. They simply know more about what brings on severe financial crises and what we can realistically expect from a recovery than anyone else. Recently Republican economists have been arguing that the recovery from the current crisis is historically mild, thus blaming the Obama administration. Reinhardt and Rogoff answered once here, and Paul Krugman answers here.

But that hasn’t stopped the Republican story from spreading so Reinhart and Rogoff have answered again in This time is different, again? The US five years after the onset of subprime.  They write that: “According to our (2009) metrics, the aftermath of the US financial crisis has been quite typical of post-war systemic financial crises around the globe. If one really wants to focus just on US systemic financial crises, then the recent recovery looks positively brisk.”

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Krugman on This Time Isn’t Different

Posted on October 22, 2012 by Maurice T. Cunningham

Last week I linked to an article by the economists Carmen Reinhardt and Kenneth S. Rogoff who wrote This Time Is Different: Eight Centuries of Financial Follies. Reinhardt and Rogoff had posted an article at Bloomberg refuting the Republican argument that U.S. recoveries are unlike those of other countries and the slowness of our comeback is attributable to the Obama administration. Now Paul Krugman has taken up not only the policy implications but the politics of the Republican argument, noting for instance that one proponent of the Republican position is Phil Gramm. Remember him? Krugman does:

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