Logical Limits To Bubbles | 51 comments (51 topical, 0 editorial, 0 hidden)

Re: Logical Limits To Bubbles (4.00 / 3)

'Most rapacious, greedy, shortsighted and amoral', surely?

What bothers me is that we're still not seeing enough of a pushback on this. So far all we have is a promise to think about minimising bonus culture.

With Rubin whispering in Obama's ear, I'm not convinced we're going to get more than that.

by ThatBritGuy (thatbritguy (at) googlemail.com) on Thu Oct 16th, 2008 at 08:51:54 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Logical Limits To Bubbles (4.00 / 3)

From the Wapo article:

Rubin said, in the recent interview, that he had his own qualms about derivatives, going back to his days as a managing partner at Goldman Sachs. He later wrote in a 2003 book that "derivatives, with leverage limits that vary from little to none at all, should be subject to comprehensive and higher margin requirements," forcing dealers to put up more capital to back the swaps. "But that will almost surely not happen, absent a crisis."
Asked why he didn't suggest stricter capital requirements as an alternative in 1998, Rubin said, "There was no political reality of getting it done. We were so caught up with other issues that were so pressing. . . . the Asian financial crisis, the Brazilian financial crisis. We had a lot going on."

So, ya see, if there's no crisis, there's not a hope of getting done what needs to be done; but when there is one, there are so many other things to do, sigh...

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Thu Oct 16th, 2008 at 09:03:05 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Logical Limits To Bubbles (4.00 / 3)

Yeah, Rubin belongs right up there with Greenspan as an advocate for self serving willful blindness. He convinced Clinton to buy into it in return for low bond rates and an "expanding economy." While there were many who instinctively felt that this policy was fraught with peril, they could be easily marginalized. Consider Clinton's dilemma. Peace with Wall Street and economic expansion that seemed to benefit all or war with Wall Street and a certain recession which would likely turn him into a one term president. Would the US and the world have been better off with Dole in '96? Or Kemp? Or Forbes?

This is all part of the knock-on effects of the US and Britain's manipulations in Iran in the "50s. Rescuing and propping up the Shah was a brilliant success right up until it wasn't. The collateral damage from the Iranian Revolution was the humiliation of Carter and the victory of Reagan. I seriously doubt that Reagan could have won in '80 without the Iranian Hostage Crisis. Reagan had been a pitchman since the '50s and given the chance he was perfectly suited to pitch neo-classical economics to the public. Uncle Milty and his acolytes got places of influence again under Reagan. The post-Watergate reforms had not really yet been consolidated and proved easily subverted. One of the lasting contributions of Jimmy Carter, a practicing and believing Christian who strove to embody the moral and ethical values of Jesus in his personal and professional conduct, was to validate the legitimacy of the entry of the fundamentalist charlatans into US politics in a big way.

"It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."

by ARGeezer (ARGeezer a in a circle eurotrib daught com) on Thu Oct 16th, 2008 at 10:54:45 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Logical Limits To Bubbles (none / 1)

Taking stupid ideas and inverting them does not make them good ideas. So taking the dumb idea that being wealthy implies morality and inverting it to say that being wealthy implies immorality does not produce a truth.

There are lots of rapacious, greedy, shortsighted and amoral poor people and not all rich people are nasty.

by Colman (colman at eurotrib.com) on Thu Oct 16th, 2008 at 09:24:44 AM EST
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Re: Logical Limits To Bubbles (4.00 / 2)

It's not the inversion, it's a century and a half of empirical evidence that Wall St culture has no intrinsic morality except the so-called morality of wealth.

Also, charities might provide you with some interesting data points about the relative generosity of the very wealthy and the not so wealthy.

It's a cultural and evangelical problem, not an individual one. The poor may or may not be rapacious, but Wall St's culture unarguably has been, to everyone's long term detriment - qv. Anglo Disease, etc.

by ThatBritGuy (thatbritguy (at) googlemail.com) on Thu Oct 16th, 2008 at 10:54:58 AM EST
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Re: Logical Limits To Bubbles (none / 1)

Rather excellent DemocracyNow! broadcast this morning. It constructs a debate between Obama, McCain (clips), McKinney, and Nader (live). Cynthia's like, We need to "nationalize" the FRB. AHAHAHA.

MP3 will be posted later today.

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

by Cat on Thu Oct 16th, 2008 at 09:40:23 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Logical Limits To Bubbles (4.00 / 2)

Nationalizing the FRB is pretty funny, however, insuring that it acts in some believable construct of the "national interest" that extends beyond the current business cycle is a worthy goal.

"It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."

by ARGeezer (ARGeezer a in a circle eurotrib daught com) on Thu Oct 16th, 2008 at 11:00:38 AM EST
[ Parent ]

OHO! (none / 1)

See, that idea there, "national interest," is 'xactly the nub 'round which I'm twisting the Treasury article I promised you ;) I'm collecting my thoughts and links, yo, in order to spare the casual reader my incoherence.

Aren't too many 'Mericans (and others) with practical business experience outside corporate training: The "is,is" of capital structure and strategy. Ha.

As for "business cycle": May I recommend James Hamilton, "What is real about the business cycle." (St Louie Fed, 2005) I lost the link, sorry, but it's brief and is nicely illustrated with polynomial functions, graphed. His conclusion cracks me up every time.

"If an accurate statistical description of the dynamic behavior of key economic magnitudes is a time-invariant linear model such as equation (4), the the correct answer is,there is no such thing as a business cycle."

That's not the funny part. The funny part, to me, is NBER assignments of "recession" to periods 1857-1912.

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

by Cat on Thu Oct 16th, 2008 at 12:21:35 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: OHO! (4.00 / 2)

Aren't too many 'Mericans (and others) with practical business experience outside corporate training: The "is,is" of capital structure and strategy. Ha.

Too true, sadly. It seems as though ET is a refuge for Capitalism's discontents. Those who enter the field with degrees in business, especially MBAs, often have large college loans to pay off and need the kinds of salaries that are mostly confined to large corporations in order to pay off their loans. I would imagine it is a lot easier to survive in that world if one is a true believer. If you have doubts, best keep them to yourself.

I for one greatly appreciate your contributions, even though I struggle to understand your posts. I suspect that much of what you convey requires the context from which you abstract to be fully comprehendable. I lack the direct experience required.

The rap on me has always been that if you ask me what time it is I will tell you how the watch works prior to telling you the time. This is because part of my education is technical. I don't expect non-technical people to understand much of what I want to convey. I try to resolve this by providing deft, (to me!) sketches of background information as a preface. If one wants to learn something complex, intricate and technical, one should not expect it to be easy. Best if one is not too concerned about appearing ignorant or foolish when asking questions as well. My philosophy is that we are all fools. Part of the human condition.

"It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."

by ARGeezer (ARGeezer a in a circle eurotrib daught com) on Thu Oct 16th, 2008 at 03:00:27 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: OHO! (4.00 / 2)

The rap on me has always been that if you ask me what time it is I will tell you how the watch works prior to telling you the time.

LOL. I second that. I have half of "formal" education, informed by 20 years hard knocks, and a personal prediliction to be cryptic! Good Lord, my child is exasperated by my long, windy digressions.

Fools though we may be, the willing find the way.

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

by Cat on Thu Oct 16th, 2008 at 04:39:46 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: OHO! (none / 1)

For James Hamilton, the St Louis Fed article you reference is here (pdf).

Hamilton blogs on Econbrowser.

Strangely, Gogol was incapable of returning the article reference (yet your title is exact). It found only one ref on the Web, your comment here.

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Fri Oct 17th, 2008 at 02:07:14 AM EST
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Re: OHO! (none / 0)

LOL. "Gogol". Now that is some good poetry!

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

by Cat on Fri Oct 17th, 2008 at 04:05:01 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: OHO! (none / 1)

This is the gogol I know

You can't be me, I'm taken

by Sven Triloqvist on Fri Oct 17th, 2008 at 04:10:05 PM EST
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Re: OHO! (none / 0)

DOOD!!! Nicolai. LOL. I was forced to read this and Pushkin <reckless eyeballing> in highschool!!!

You know Pushkin was a "black" man, right? LOL.

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

by Cat on Fri Oct 17th, 2008 at 04:16:34 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: OHO! (4.00 / 2)

The Tale of how Ivan Ivanovich Quarrelled with Ivan Nikiforovich is the funniest thing ever written in the history of everything ever written.

"Pretending that you already know the answer when you don't is not actually very helpful." ~Migeru.

by poemless on Fri Oct 17th, 2008 at 04:33:23 PM EST
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Re: OHO! (none / 0)

I know you read poetry. You can't play me.

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

by Cat on Fri Oct 17th, 2008 at 05:34:59 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: OHO! (none / 0)

It's not poetry.

"Pretending that you already know the answer when you don't is not actually very helpful." ~Migeru.

by poemless on Fri Oct 17th, 2008 at 05:43:20 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: OHO! (none / 0)

Yes, it is. All "fiction" is poetry.

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

by Cat on Fri Oct 17th, 2008 at 06:10:56 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: OHO! (none / 0)

Futhermore, mathematics is poetry. The definition of poetry is intepretation of language.

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

by Cat on Fri Oct 17th, 2008 at 06:14:11 PM EST
[ Parent ]

p.s. PDF is on my drive ;) (none / 0)

and FTP. Inquiries welcomed.

Your GOOG mining reminded me of some reconn I did a few months ago on the topic "participatory realism," i.e. "magical thinking." I used to quote Piaget extensively from books that I own. I found that my comment here ranks in top ten.

Inquiries welcomed.

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

by Cat on Fri Oct 17th, 2008 at 04:12:39 PM EST
[ Parent ]

GOGOL (none / 1)

I think I saw ThatBritGuy use it. Also my eight-year-old granddaughter who picked up the name from overheard conversations (in French, where Google may be pronounced closer to Gogol), and turned it into her favourite insult. In her language, it applies to anyone who is pushing her around or being generally annoying, so, quite often, her elder sister, who gets called espèce de Gogol!

Nikolai is a great story-teller.

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Sat Oct 18th, 2008 at 02:59:35 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Logical Limits To Bubbles (none / 0)

Wait a minute: I forgot to mention that his series dat SKIPS, IGNORES, DOES NOT COMPUTE, DOES NOT MODEL, the period 1913-1947.

AHAHAHA.

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

by Cat on Thu Oct 16th, 2008 at 12:33:57 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Logical Limits To Bubbles (none / 0)

Breaking the Sound Barrier: Third-Party Candidates Ralph Nader & Cynthia McKinney Respond to Final McCain-Obama Debate

MP3 podcast | rush transcript

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

by Cat on Fri Oct 17th, 2008 at 04:02:09 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Logical Limits To Bubbles (4.00 / 3)

<blockqoute>With Rubin whispering in Obama's ear, I'm not convinced we're going to get more than that.</blockqoute>

I agree. And after the events of the past eight years, I can't decide whether it's comedy or tragedy that the best hope for real change in my country was denied because the message of change was coopted by people who want anything but.

I'm more than a little irritated about what's gone on here, and I can't help but think that in a few years the gig will be up, and the people like me who called this dog and pony show for what it is will be vindicated.

But we may all be in the soup line by the time that happens....

And I'll give my consent to any government that does not deny a man a living wage-Billy Bragg

by ManfromMiddletown (manfrommiddletown at lycos dot com) on Thu Oct 16th, 2008 at 01:14:47 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Logical Limits To Bubbles | 51 comments (51 topical, 0 editorial, 0 hidden)

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