Monday, October 27, 2008

Relax: There Is No Financial Crisis

If you take the time to read this you will see that bank credit has never been higher, interbank lending is ripping along just nicely and commercial paper (for other than financial institutions) is doing just fine.


Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis
Research Department
Facts andMyths about the Financial Crisis of 2008
V.V. Chari, Lawrence Christiano, and Patrick J. Kehoe
October 2008

ABSTRACT
The United States is indisputably undergoing a financial crisis. Here we examine four claims about the way the financial crisis is affecting the economy as a whole and argue that all four claims are myths. Conventional analyses of the financial crisis focus on interest rate spreads. We argue that such analyses may lead to mistaken inferences about the real costs of borrowing and argue that, during financial crises, variations in the levels of nominal interest rates might lead to better inferences about variations in the real costs of borrowing.

http://www.minneapolisfed.org/research/WP/WP666.pdf


My conclusions?
-- We've printed too much money
-- Basic economics teach us inflation will follow a short period of downturn
-- The world is not ending

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