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发帖数: 4321 | 1 这个好像瘸子走路怪地不平。我就不说我的观点了。看看格林斯潘怎么说的
In March 2008, Greenspan wrote an article for the Financial Times'
Economists' Forum in which he said that the 2008-financial crisis in the
United States is likely to be judged as the most wrenching since the end of
World War II. In it he argued: "We will never be able to anticipate all
discontinuities in financial markets." He concluded: "It is important,
indeed crucial, that any reforms in, and adjustments to, the structure of
markets and regulation not inhibit our most reliable and effective
safeguards against cumulative economic failure: market flexibility and open
competition." The article attracted a number of critical responses from
forum contributors, who, finding causation between Greenspan's policies and
the discontinuities in financial markets that followed, criticized Greenspan
mainly for what many believed to be his unbalanced and immovable
ideological suppositions about global capitalism and free competitive
markets. Notable critics included J. Bradford DeLong, Paul Krugman, Alice
Rivlin, Michael Hudson, and Willem Buiter.[79]
Greenspan responded to his critics in a follow-up article in which he
defended his ideology as applied to his conceptual and policy framework,
which, among other things, prohibited him from exerting real pressure
against the burgeoning housing bubble or, in his words, "leaning against the
wind". Greenspan argued, "My view of the range of dispersion of outcomes
has been shaken, but not my judgment that free competitive markets are by
far the unrivaled way to organize economies." He concluded: "We have tried
regulation ranging from heavy to central planning. None meaningfully worked.
Do we wish to retest the evidence?"[80] The Financial Times associate
editor and chief economics commentator, Martin Wolf, responded to the
discussion with an article defending Greenspan primarily as a scapegoat for
the market turmoil. Several notable contributors in defense of Greenspan
included Stephen Roach, Allan Meltzer, and Robert Brusca.[81]
An October 15, 2008, article in the Washington Post analyzing the origins of
the economic crisis claims that Greenspan vehemently opposed any regulation
of derivatives, and actively sought to undermine the office of the
Commodity Futures Trading Commission when the Commission sought to initiate
regulation of derivatives. Meanwhile, Greenspan recommended improving mark-
to-market regulations to avoid having derivatives or other complex assets
marked to a distressed or illiquid market during times of material adverse
conditions as seen during the late 2000s credit crisis.[82]
Greenspan was not alone is his opposition to derivatives regulation. In a
1999 government report that was a key driver in the passage of the Commodity
Futures Modernization Act of 2000—legislation that clarified that most
over-the-counter derivatives were outside the regulatory authority of any
government agency—Greenspan was joined by Treasury Secretary Lawrence
Summers, Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Arthur Levitt, and
Commodity Futures Trading Commission Chairman William Ranier in concluding
that "under many circumstances, the trading of financial derivatives by
eligible swap participants should be excluded from the CEA" (Commodity
Exchange Act). Other government agencies also supported that view.[83]
In Congressional testimony on October 23, 2008, Greenspan acknowledged that
he was "partially" wrong in opposing regulation and stated "Those of us who
have looked to the self-interest of lending institutions to protect
shareholder's equity — myself especially — are in a state of shocked
disbelief."[55] Referring to his free-market ideology, Greenspan said: “I
have found a flaw. I don’t know how significant or permanent it is. But I
have been very distressed by that fact.” Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA) then
pressed him to clarify his words. "In other words, you found that your view
of the world, your ideology, was not right, it was not working," Waxman said
. "Absolutely, precisely," Greenspan replied. "You know, that’s precisely
the reason I was shocked, because I have been going for 40 years or more
with very considerable evidence that it was working exceptionally well."[84]
Greenspan admitted fault[85] in opposing regulation of derivatives and
acknowledged that financial institutions didn't protect shareholders and
investments as well as he expected.
Matt Taibbi described the Greenspan put and its bad consequences saying: "
every time the banks blew up a speculative bubble, they could go back to the
Fed and borrow money at zero or one or two percent, and then start the game
all over", thereby making it "almost impossible" for the banks to lose
money.[86] He also called Greenspan a "classic con man" who, through
political savvy, "flattered and bullshitted his way up the Matterhorn of
American power and ... jacked himself off to the attention of Wall Street
for 20 consecutive years."[87]
In the documentary film Inside Job Greenspan is cited as one of the persons
responsible for the Economic Meltdown of 2008 and named in Time Magazine as
one of the "25 People to Blame for the Financial Crisis". |
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