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I suspect Simon Johnson would go for #3, "brawney recovery"
If we continue to depend on "cheap enough" oil, that's dangerous enough in geopolitical terms.  But if we run our economy so we finance our oil imports by borrowing heavily from the outside world (not all from China; the Middle East and Japan are also big providers of net savings), we are asking for trouble.

The collapse of the dollar is not necessarily imminent, and the temporary use of deficit spending makes senes as a way to get through this deep recession.  But when exactly do we plan to wean ourselves off (a) the oil, and (b) the borrowing from abroad?  This doesn't have to be done tomorrow, but it has to be done - unless it is somewhere written that the US will stay powerful and solvent forever.

-Skip-

Just don't tell me that the financial sector will collapse if we make any moves in the right direction, e.g., cutting back on our current budget-breaking implicit subsidies to that enormous rent-seeking sector; we're on our way to doubling our debt/GDP ratio, from around 40% to near 80%, directly because of the way this sector has behaved.  Remember the excessive power of particular sectors (and all their policymaking friends) consistently hampers sensible efforts to reform any economy. If that's too vague for you, look at how and why Gorbachev failed - and all the awful consequences.


See especially the many graphs of inflation vs. growth, output decline, etc. in Simon's link.  It shows the cost of delaying needed reforms.  Chilling.

As the Dutch said while fighting the Spanish: "It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."
by ARGeezer (ARGeezer a in a circle eurotrib daught com) on Wed Jun 3rd, 2009 at 12:11:35 AM EST
[ Parent ]
would be the best choice. But first a carbon tax, which is what Simon Johnson tried to say after reading all my comments he did not publish, hahaha.

Patrice Ayme Patriceayme.com Patriceayme.wordpress.com http://tyranosopher.blogspot.com/
by Patrice Ayme on Wed Jun 3rd, 2009 at 01:42:46 PM EST
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