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European Tribune - LQD: Learning from the Swedish banking crisis
The Japanese credit crisis is usually cited as the benchmark for what not to do. But few cite Sweden's crisis as a template on what might actually work. ... the Swedish authorities realized early on that a banking crisis cannot be resolved until the problem is properly defined. That means assessing who the "bad" and "good" houses of issues are and be willing to allow the "bad houses" to fail (as an aside, "good houses" do not necessarily imply "big" houses).

Why should the Americans look to Sweden for an example?

Wikipedia: Emergency Banking Act

The Emergency Banking Act (also known as the Emergency Banking Relief Act) was an act of the United States Congress spearheaded by President Franklin D. Roosevelt during the Great Depression. It was passed on March 9, 1933. The act allowed a plan that would close down insolvent banks and reorganize and reopen those banks strong enough to survive.

On March 5, 1933, the day after Roosevelt's inauguration, he called a special session of Congress which instituted a mandatory four-day bank holiday. This act provided for the reopening of banks after federal inspectors had declared them to be financially secure.

...

Within 300 days of the act's passage, 5,000 banks had passed inspection and were reopened. Roughly two-thirds of U.S. banks quickly reopened under this act, and faith in banking institutions was somewhat restored.

Most banks were, in fact, allowed to reopen after the 4-day bank holiday.

The problem is Americans are not allowed to look at their own history and realize that the New Deal and Keynesianism work. And even if they were allowed they probably would wrinkle their nose and balk at the "Socialism".

It'd be nice if the battle were only against the right wingers, not half of the left on top of that — François in Paris

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Tue Mar 18th, 2008 at 07:29:17 AM EST

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