| “The Return of Depression Economics (and the Crisis of 2008)” (2009©) — book review | |
| This book is authored by Dr. Paul Krugman, who won the Nobel Prize in economics in 2008. That’s kind of an easy way to validate that he knows what he’s talking about in terms of economics. I actually completed this book earlier in the month, but have just been too lazy to get around to this review… | |
| Basically, the good doctor is a progressive / liberal economist from the Keynes / Galbraith school of government “interference” in the free market to both stimulate the economy and restrict bad business practices (i.e. monopolies). This means, when the inevitable market slow-down occurs, the author feels it is the government’s job to step in and provide demand for goods and services which will keep the economy ticking along. The failure to do so, the author states, results in a stalled or failing economy, which starts a self-fulfilling prophecy / death spiral of recession or depression. To prevent the excesses of capitalism, he proposes, a stricter regulation of banks and non-bank money (credit) generators. In theory, this decreases the size of economic bubbles and the resulting “crashes” which follow the inevitable bubble burst. | |
| The bottom line appears to be that markets are subject to “bubbles”. Bubbles are periods of overconfidence which directly result in price increases to the point of frenzy. However, when the frenzy pauses to catch its breath, everything tends to go to hell in a handbasket unless the government is willing (and sometimes it isn’t) to step in and save everyone’s bacon. The buying frenzy then becomes a selling panic and the free flow of funds / capital means individual national economies can end up in very deep do-do, very quickly. | |
| Final recommendation: highly recommended. I recognize I am also a progressive / liberal who is predisposed to agree with the author’s opinions and arguments, but I found the basic arguments to be in agreement with my own experiences over the last 50 years. The book is written in standard English for the “off-the-street” (non-economist) person to understand. It is relatively short at under 200 pages and I found it to be a fairly fast read. Well worth your time to understand some of why the world is functioning the way it does. | |
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| On This Day In: | |
| 2016 | Election + 1 Month |
| 2015 | Dance And Sing |
| 2014 | A Measuring Stick For Progress |
| 2013 | Courtly Love Or Victory Over Habit |
| 2012 | Have We Met? |
| 2011 | Efficiently Useless |
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