{"id":29197,"date":"2017-12-27T16:57:34","date_gmt":"2017-12-27T21:57:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=29197"},"modified":"2017-12-27T16:57:34","modified_gmt":"2017-12-27T21:57:34","slug":"the-great-recession-10-years-later-lessons-we-still-have-to-learn","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=29197","title":{"rendered":"The Great Recession 10 years later: Lessons we still have to learn"},"content":{"rendered":"<h3 id=\"page-title\" class=\"title\"><a href=\"http:\/\/thehill.com\/opinion\/finance\/366456-the-great-recession-10-years-later-lessons-we-still-have-to-learn\">The Great Recession 10 years later: Lessons we still have to learn<\/a><\/h3>\n<div class=\"blogs-social-wrp\">\n<div class=\"share\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div id=\"content\" class=\"column\">\n<article class=\"node-366456 node node-article view-mode-full clearfix\">\n<header><\/header>\n<div class=\"content-img-wrp\">\n<div class=\"content-img\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/thehill.com\/sites\/default\/files\/styles\/thumb_small_article\/public\/gettyimages-871810744_1.jpg?itok=CnENYmi0\" alt=\"The Great Recession 10 years later: Lessons we still have to learn\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" \/><\/div>\n<div class=\"credits\">\u00a9 Getty<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"content-with-sidebar-wrp\">\n<div class=\"content-wrp\">\n<div class=\"field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden\">\n<div class=\"field-items\">\n<div class=\"field-item even\">\n<p>Ten years ago this month, a recession began in the U.S. that would metastasize into a full-fledged financial crisis. A decade is plenty of time to reflect on what we have learned, what we have fixed, and what remains to be done. High on the agenda should be the utter unpreparedness for what came along. The memoirs of key decision-makers convey sincere intentions and in some cases, very adroit maneuvering. But common to them all are apologies that today strike one as rather lame.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI was surprised by the sudden crisis,\u201d <a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Decision-Points-George-W-Bush\/dp\/0307590631\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">wrote<\/a> George W. Bush, \u201cMy focus had been kitchen-table economic issues like jobs and inflation. I assumed any major credit troubles would have been flagged by the regulators or rating agencies. \u2026 We were blindsided by a financial crisis that had been more than a decade in the making.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Ben Bernanke, chairman of the Fed <a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Courage-Act-Memoir-Crisis-Aftermath\/dp\/039324721X\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">wrote<\/a>, \u201cClearly, many of us at the Fed, including me, underestimated the extent of the housing bubble and the risks it posed.\u201d He cited psychological factors rather than low interest rates, a \u201ctidal wave of foreign money,\u201d and complacency among decision-makers. Timothy Geithner <a href=\"https:\/\/books.google.com\/books?id=NeqMDQAAQBAJ&amp;pg=PA114&amp;lpg=PA114&amp;dq=failures+of+foresight+were+primarily+failures+of+imagination%E2%80%A6our+visions+of+darkness+still+weren%E2%80%99t+dark+enough&amp;source=bl&amp;ots=5B0nwV2m4u&amp;sig=zyWwcFb4-_0F308Cgl5XnMZamg0&amp;hl=en&amp;sa=X&amp;ved=0ahUKEwjKsIe_8KbYAhWMSN8KHQjwAWEQ6AEIJzAA\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">said<\/a> that, \u201cfailures of foresight were primarily failures of imagination \u2026 our visions of darkness still weren\u2019t dark enough.\u201d And Henry Paulson <a href=\"https:\/\/books.google.com\/books?id=2YUBAAAAQBAJ&amp;pg=PT75&amp;lpg=PT75&amp;dq=we+believed+the+problem+was+largely+confined+to+subprime+loans.+%E2%80%A6+(Then)+the+problems+were+coming+far+more+quickly.&amp;source=bl&amp;ots=AGsYA3MTnC&amp;sig=LxX1PWsr47xwlJ8wq0-2vMn2-D8&amp;hl=en&amp;sa=X&amp;ved=0ahUKEwiVnczN8KbYAhUyleAKHSYRAVQQ6AEIJzAA\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">explained<\/a> that \u201cwe believed the problem was largely confined to subprime loans. \u2026 (Then) the problems were coming far more quickly.\u201dSurprise, underestimation, poor imagination, and disbelief in an adverse outcome are hallmarks of the onset of a financial crisis.<\/p>\n<p>&#8230;click on the above link to read the rest of the article&#8230;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/article>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Great Recession 10 years later: Lessons we still have to learn \u00a9 Getty Ten years ago this month, a recession began in the U.S. that would metastasize into a full-fledged financial crisis. A decade is plenty of time to reflect on what we have learned, what we have fixed, and what remains to be [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[195,312,384,17689,17688,15519,827],"class_list":["post-29197","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-economics","tag-debt","tag-financial-crisis","tag-great-recession","tag-lessons","tag-robert-f-bruner","tag-the-hill","tag-united-states"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29197","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=29197"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29197\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29198,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29197\/revisions\/29198"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=29197"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=29197"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=29197"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}