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After reading this thread, & finding it very informative & interesting, I'm still left thinking there are things unsaid. I agree, Greenspan's influence was pernicious, as was the utter lack of enforcement of existing regulations. I'm astounded there was no clearing agency for debt swaps. I'm outraged there was so little, or no, regulation of mortgage lenders.:mad:

I notice, however, there was little mention of regulation, or creation, of derivatives themselves. It makes me wonder if a "brake" on their use as credit default swap tools (which, AIUI, they were) would not have been a good thing--if an outright ban wouldn't have been good.

I wonder what changes following the S&L scandal didn't happen, but might have, which could have prevented the '08 Crash.

I wonder, too, if USG response to "too big to fail" wasn't nonsensical: that is, couldn't, shouldn't, the "deadbeat" banks simply have been wound up & shut down?

Maybe most fundamentally, tho, I wonder about what was driving the housing bubble. Yes, USG was encouraging home ownership. Yes, there were "ninja" loans. Yes, there was speculation. Was it deeper than that? Was there something in U.S. policy driving people to buy? I have in mind the economic stratification, encouraging richer people to buy/build bigger houses, which pushes people in lower strata to buy bigger than they can really afford. Is this a bigger influence than regulators, & Congress, recognized? Or is it smaller than it looks?

So, with these facts in mind, what would you say are the earliest, & the latest, points the Great Recession could be stopped? Was it still possible in '07? Or did it need to be while FDR was still PotUS?:p I'm not concerned with foresight, here: if the change goes back that far, IMO, it's a structural issue, & that means somebody might recognize it almost anytime.

Any thoughts?
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