Getting it wrong [ how faulty monetary statistics undermine the Fed, the financial system, and the economy

Blame for the recent financial crisis and subsequent recession has commonly been assigned to everyone from Wall Street firms to individual homeowners. It has been widely argued that the crisis and recession were caused by "greed" and the failure of mainstream economics. In this book, leadi...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Barnett, William A. (Author)
Format: Electronic Book
Language:English
Published: Cambridge, Massachusetts : MIT Press , c2012
Subjects:

MARC

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100 1 |a Barnett, William A. ,   |e author 
245 1 0 |a Getting it wrong [  |h [electronic resource]] :   |b how faulty monetary statistics undermine the Fed, the financial system, and the economy   |c William A. Barnett 
260 |a Cambridge, Massachusetts :   |b MIT Press ,   |c c2012 
300 |a 1 online resource (xxxi, 322 p.) :   |b ill. 
504 |a Includes bibliographical references (p. [299]-311) and index 
505 0 |a 1. The facts without the math -- 2. Mathematical appendixes 
520 |a Blame for the recent financial crisis and subsequent recession has commonly been assigned to everyone from Wall Street firms to individual homeowners. It has been widely argued that the crisis and recession were caused by "greed" and the failure of mainstream economics. In this book, leading economist William Barnett argues instead that there was too little use of the relevant economics, especially from the literature on economic measurement. Barnett contends that as financial instruments became more complex, the simple-sum monetary aggregation formulas used by central banks, including the U.S. Federal Reserve, became obsolete. Instead, a major increase in public availability of best-practice data was needed. Households, firms, and governments, lacking the requisite information, incorrectly assessed systemic risk and significantly increased their leverage and risk-taking activities. Better financial data, Barnett argues, could have signaled the misperceptions and prevented the erroneous systemic-risk assessments. When extensive, best-practice information is not available from the central bank, increased regulation can constrain the adverse consequences of ill-informed decisions. Instead, there was deregulation. The result, Barnett argues, was a worst-case toxic mix: increasing complexity of financial instruments, inadequate and poor-quality data, and declining regulation. Following his accessible narrative of the deep causes of the crisis and the long history of private and public errors, Barnett provides technical appendixes, containing the mathematical analysis supporting his arguments. -- Back Cover 
650 0 |a Econometrics 
650 0 |a Finance   |x Mathematical models 
650 0 |a Financial crises 
650 0 |a Monetary policy   |z United States 
651 0 |a United States   |x Economic policy   |y 2009- 
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