Brad DeLong

Liveblogging World War II: January 28, 1942

2012-01-28T02:08:32-08:00

In spite of rather gray looking skies, I left Washington yesterday afternoon, hoping to land in New York about 6:45. But we came down at an unfamiliar airport, and I found we were in Philadelphia and the flight was cancelled. I drove to the station and caught a train almost immediately and reached my house at 9:15, so I might just as well have taken a 5:00 o'clock train out of Washington.

I talked to some Army boys on the way over, who had just had their orders. One youngster in a sailor's uniform sat just a few seats ahead of me. When he turned around, I felt sure he must have added a few years to his age, for he looked fourteen instead of eighteen. They tell me that the boys coming over here from England to get their training in flying, are very young, ranging from 16 to twenty. Some of our own pilots are 20 to twenty-two. It is a curious thing to me, that older people seem so often to accept with complacency these young armies. I rebel, and yet I know an army must be young.

I have a great desire to see our fighting forces organized in the most efficient possible way, by putting each individual in the place where he will serve best, because only in that way shall we shorten the horrible period through which we are living. I want to see everyone in civilian life at the present time, doing the job he is best able to do, and doing it as well as he possibly can.

If women are able and skillful enough to go into factories, I hope they will. I hope that all men, young or old, who work in factories in defense industries, will do the most efficient job that can be done. Whatever the jobs are that people are doing, I want them done by the right people and in the best possible way, because that is the way to win this war.

Every day that goes on, means more young men in every land are dying. I am confident that our cause is just, but I want to see youth free again to fight a different kind of war, a war to find a way by which we all live more decently and happily together.

All of us know that, at the end of this war, that other war has to be fought, and we shall need youth to fight it. I hope that, in every factory today, and in every service camp, young people are discussing the kind of a world they intend to build after the fighting is over.

It may not be the kind of a world in which my generation has lived, but if it achieves the ends for which we are fighting: real freedom for every individual regardless of race, creed or color, economic freedom for every individual who is willing to put his capacities to work of some kind, then these horrible days will have obtained good results. We have to live through them and I accept the necessity, but at the same time I hope we do our share in civilian life to prepare for a different and better future world.

Twitterstorm delong: January 27, 2012

2012-01-27T19:42:58-08:00

delong J. Bradford DeLong Carried Interest Tax Break Exposes Mitt Romney Electability Myth blogs.investors.com/capitalhill/in… 7 minutes ago
paullewismoney Paul Lewis Always thought it strange that you motivate rich by throwing money at them, but you motivate poor by taking money away. #hester 19 hours ago Retweeted by delong
davidfrum davidfrum Associates confirm to WashPo what was already obvious: Ron Paul has lied & lied about his racist newsletters http://tinyurl.com/8xc7fqg 11 hours ago Retweeted by delong
delong J. Bradford DeLong The Debate on Private Equity in 1989, Peter Róna addressing Jensen | Rortybomb http://rortybomb.wordpress.com/2012/01/26/the… 13 hours ago
drgrist David Roberts Tonight in Florida, the GOP candidates weren't asked a single question about Social Security. Instead, the moon. And their wives. 23 hours ago Retweeted by delong
brianbeutler Brian Beutler RT @prwerdel: Romney doesnt want us becoming like Europe, where they have awesome, awesome bank accounts. 26 Jan Retweeted by delong
DavidCornDC David Corn Follow-up question to Newt: "Did you seek God's guidance when you okayed the impeachment crusade against Clinton while having an affair?" 26 Jan Retweeted by delong
DanRiehl DanRiehl Obama is going to slice and dice Romney on RomneyCare, no way around it. And I bet low-info primary voters won't get the importance 26 Jan Retweeted by delong
daveweigel daveweigel RT @mattyglesias: Florida seems like a good place to ask why unlimited entry to the USA is good for Cubans, but not for other people. 26 Jan Retweeted by delong
daveweigel daveweigel RT @kathleenparker: Callista is an accomplished person who deserves more than our cynicism and our snark. And I mean that. 26 Jan Retweeted by delong
daveweigel daveweigel Big big laughs in press room when Gingrich says "all three of the wives" #CNNdebate 26 Jan Retweeted by delong
aterkel aterkel MT @huffposthill These guys are smart. The electoral votes they'll garner frm Puerto Rico and the Moon will really help them in the general. 26 Jan Retweeted by delong
ktumulty Karen Tumulty. Please, Wolf, stop before you ask this first lady question. really. it is not too late. #cnndebate 26 Jan Retweeted by delong
daveweigel daveweigel Good lord, did Arnold Rothstein pay Newt to throw this? #CNNdebate 26 Jan Retweeted by delong
DemocratMachine Viva DemocratMachine the way Mitt Romney tells it, there wasn't a Republican primary for him to vote in back in 1992. Total lie. #CNNDebate 26 Jan Retweeted by delong
AmandaMarcotte Amanda Marcotte And that's been your 60 seconds of Ron Paul sounding lucid, so progressive dudes can gloat about how much the wuv him for another week. 26 Jan Retweeted by delong
DemocratMachine Viva DemocratMachine nobody tell Mitt Romney that Raul Castro runs Cuba now. #CNNDebate 26 Jan Retweeted by delong
LarrySabato Larry Sabato I don't believe Mitt told truth about 1992. He voted Tsongas in D POTUS primary when Bush 41 was facing Pat Buchanan, same day 3/10/92. 26 Jan Retweeted by delong
AdamSerwer AdamSerwer Shorter Romney: I love Israel so much there's no way I'd try to keep it from self-destructing. 26 Jan Retweeted by delong »
AriBerman Ari Berman Shorter Newt: Palestinians "invented people." Spanish "language of the ghetto." Obama "food stamp president."
jdportes Jonathan Portes @ @delong Actually, the chart on my blog is more up-to-date (and hence gloomier) http://notthetreasuryview.blogspot.com/2012/01/recess… 26 Jan
katforrester Katrina Forrester Great post from @delong The British Economy Is Now Doing Worse than it Did in the Great Depression http://flpbd.it/fdAN 8 hours ago
evansorem EvanSorem @
@brianbeutler @delong yes! You can spell R money with Romney. Coincidence - hardly from his perspective!! 9 hours ago
Potterybarnmerc Olivia RT @delong: RT @daveweigel: Big big laughs in press room when Gingrich says "all three of the wives" #CNNdebate 26 Jan
Lulz4l1f3 Lulz4l1f3 @ @delong Confusing VC and PE? I hate when that happens. Some of the nicest people I know are VC folks. Forget Romney, poor VC ppl. 26 Jan
wonkinakilt Joe Colucci Supply chain: still one of the coolest (and most important) productivity improvements of recent years. via @delong http://bit.ly/yopO78 26 Jan
Beyerstein Lindsay Beyerstein @ .@curiouscliche @moetkacik @delong In Rand-World anti-cig=antilife; anti-dexedrine=antilifelibertyandpersuitofhappiness. 25 Jan
BizTrends FRANK FEATHER RT @delong: Udacity and the future of online universities | Felix Salmon http://reut.rs/xnz3Aq via @twttimes 25 Jan

Econ 1: Spring 2012: U.C. Berkeley: Problem Set 2

2012-01-27T18:05:19-08:00

Due at the start of section following the Monday, February 6 lecture:

Problem Set 2

Problem Set 2: Demand and Supply; Market Equilibrium

J. Bradford DeLong/Lanwei Yang/etc.

Econ 1: Spring 2012: U.C. Berkeley

Due at first section after Monday, February 6 lecture

Suppose that there are four people in the economy who demand yoga lessons: Kautilya (a government economist) with an income of $1000/week, Thasuka Witko (a herder and politician) with an income of $500/week, Buffy Summers (a student at U.C. Sunnydale) with an income of $300/week, and Sappho (a poet) with an income of $600/week. Kautilya spends 1/5 of his income on yoga lessons, Thasunka Witko spends 1/10 of his income on yoga lessons, Sappho spends 1/4 of her income on yoga lessons, and Buffy Summers spends half of her income on yoga lessons. Draw the demand curve for yoga lessons in this economy. What is demand for yoga lessons if the price of yoga lessons is $10/hour? $20/hour? $30/hour? $40/hour? $50/hour?
Consider the same situation as in question (1) but with one difference. Changes in Buffy Summers's life circumstances--the opening of the Mouth of Hell on the U.C. Sunnydale campus--lead her to have no demand for yoga lessons at all as she has to spend all of her income buying sharp wooden stakes. Learning about Buffy's predicament leads Kautilya to boost his yoga expenditures to 1/4 of his income, leads Thasuka Witko to drop yoga entirely and join Buffy in her family business, while Sappho continues to spend 1/4 of her income on yoga lessons. Draw the demand curve for yoga lessons in this economy. What is demand for yoga lessons if the price of yoga lessons is $10/hour? $20/hour? $30/hour? $40/hour? $50/hour?
This new situation sees the rapid growth of a wooden stake-making industry to deal with the influx of vampires onto the U.C. Sunnydale campus. Buffy can make 20 stakes a shift and has an alternative occupation she enjoys as much as stake-making that pays her $60 a shift. Kautilya can make 10 stakes a shift and has an alternative occupation he enjoys as much as stake-making that pays him $200 a shift. Sappho has an alternative occupation she enjoys as much as stake-making that pays her $120 a shift and can make 30 stakes a shift. Thasuka Witko has an alternative occupation he enjoys as much as stake-making that pays him $100 a shift and can make 8 stakes a shift. Draw the supply curve for stakes on the U.C. Sunnydale campus. How many stakes are supplied if the price of each stake is $1? $2? $4? $8? $15? $30? $50?
In this new situation, Buffy realizes that she can order wooden stakes over the internet in unlimited quantities for a price including next-day FedEx shipping of $10/stake. Draw the new supply curve for stakes.
In the same situation as problem (4), suppose that there is a demand for 10 stakes a shift. Who makes stakes? What is the market price of stakes? How about if there is a demand for 50 stakes a shift? 100 stakes a shift? 200 stakes a shift?
Suppose that, on and near the U.C. Sunnydale campus, the weekly supply curve for lattes is given by the equation Q = max(1000 P - 2000, 0) : nobody makes any lattes unless the price is above $2/latte, and for each $1 the price is above $2 an extra 1000 lattes are made. Suppose that customers have $10,000/week to spend on lattes. Draw the supply curve and the demand curve. What is the equilibrium price of lattes? What is the equilibrium quantity of lattes?
Suppose, in the same situation as (6), that the arrival of new, charismatic yoga teachers reduces the amount of money customers have to spend on lattes to $6,000/week. Draw the supply curve. Draw the old and the new demand curves. What is the new equilibrium price of lattes? What is the new equilibrium quantity of lattes?
Suppose that, in the same situation as (6), scary newspaper stories about the health dangers of yoga lead customers to cut back on their purchases of yoga lessons and increases the amount of money they have to spend on lattes to $14,000 a week. Draw the supply curve. Draw the old and the new demand curves. What is the new equilibrium price of lattes? What is the new equilibrium quantity of lattes?
Suppose that, on and near the U.C. Sunnydale Campus, the supply curve for yoga lessons is Q = 100 P. Suppose that customers have $10,000/week to spend on yoga lessons. Draw the supply and demand curves. What is the equilibrium price of yoga lessons? What is the equilibrium quantity? Suppose that the amount of money customers have to spend on yoga lessons rises to $14,000/week? Suppose it falls to $6,000/week?
In the same situation as (9), suppose that the professors at Crony Capitalism Corrupt Rail Baron University 50 miles to the south become lazier, decide they want to teach less, and offer full course credit toward their degree to students who are willing to offer yoga lessons at U.C. Sunnydale. Suppose that enough students to teach 500 places in yoga classes a week drive up to U.C. Sunnydale to add to those offering yoga classes. Draw the new supply curve. Draw the demand curve if people have $10,000/week to spend on yoga lessons. What is the equilibrium price of yoga lessons? What is the equilibrium quantity? Suppose that the amount of money customers have to spend on yoga lessons rises to $14,000/week? Suppose it falls to $6,000/week?

Econ 1: U.C. Berkeley: Spring 2012: I Am Sick of Typing in the Long URL for the bspace Website...

2012-01-27T13:16:52-08:00

…so here is a shorter one: http://tinyurl.com/delong-Econ1Sp12

What Is the Most Popular TV Show Among 18 Year Old Californians Today?

2012-01-27T12:14:16-08:00

I need examples for my Econ 1 class. Dharma and Greg, Buffy, and Star Trek will no longer cut it...

Econ 1: Spring 2012: U.C. Berkeley: Revised Syllabus: Course Topics

2012-01-27T11:39:33-08:00

Revised Syllabus: Course Topics

Who Is Teaching in Wheeler This Semester?

2012-01-27T10:18:32-08:00

Here we all are:

MWF 9: UGBA 10: Robinson
MWF 10: Hist 7b: Einhorn
MW 11: Econ 1: DeLong
MW 12: Psych 1: Gade
F 12: L&S C180U: Reich
MW 2: Nut 10: Faghihnia
M 4-6: PH 116: Potts
W 4-5: PolSci 179: Ross

TTh 8-9:30: Int Bio 132: Brooks
TTh 9:30-11: MCB 61: Presti
TTh 11-12:30: Math 16b: Johnson
TTh 12:30-2: Anthro 1: Deacon

Still kinda surprised that Wheeler is apparently open MW 1-4, and TThF after 2

Kathleen Madigan: The Gap Between Fourth Quarter GDP and Final Sales Growth

2012-01-27T09:55:04-08:00

Kathleen Madigan:

Real Time Economics: Real GDP grew at a solid 2.8% annual rate in the fourth quarter…. [But] the bulk of GDP growth came from the inventory sector, which accounted for almost two percentage points of the top-line expansion…. The problem with inventory growth powering GDP is the uncertainty over what motivated the buildup.

If businesses stored more supplies and finished goods in their warehouses because they see future demand growing at a solid pace, then the stockpiling can be viewed as a positive sign of business confidence and for growth going forward.

If, however, businesses stockpiled in anticipation of more demand than materialized, then they ended the fourth quarter with a load of unwanted goods. If so, the buildup is a negative for the outlook because businesses will have to draw down their existing stockpiles first before ordering more supplies and merchandise.

: http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/

Alex Massie Begs the Republicans Not to Choose Gingrich

2012-01-27T06:16:46-08:00

Alex Massie:

Alex Massie: [W]hat is Gingrich's campaign actually about? Apart from typically loopy notions such as colonising the moon, nothing more than a declaration of independence from a contemptuous (and contemptible) liberal media and an anti-American elite that's notionally happy to embrace American decline. It is a brand of politics that bathes in the warm, comforting waters of victimhood but that has nothing useful to say about the actual challenges the United States faces. If this is so then it is about poking people in the eye, not about problem-solving. Indeed, while defeating suspiciously-cosmopolitan opponents is dandy, losing to them is also acceptable. For defeat reinforces the suspicion that all that's good and holy is under attack. To the Alamo, my friends!

Gingrich offers a politics of the laager. Is there more to American conservatism than this? Of course there is and must be. I still think voters will appreciate this in sufficient numbers to prove Gingrich wrong but perhaps this is too optimistic a view. Romney, desperate and dire as he is, may be a fake but in this instance the fraud is better, that is less grim, than the real thing…

The Volcker Disinflation and the Volcker Recovery Were Both Primarily the Work of… Volcker: Macroeconomic History Things That Really Should Not Need to Be Said Department

2012-01-27T06:11:37-08:00

Paul Krugman corrects the record:

Postmodern Business Cycles: Noah Smith finds John Taylor claiming that the V-shaped recovery from the 1981-2 recession proves that Reagan roolz. Kind of sad, really: I find it hard not to believe that Taylor actually knows better.

But anyway, this gives me an occasion to talk about why the sluggish recovery was predictable — and predicted. This is not an after-the-fact rationalization, I was explaining very early on that this wasn’t going to be like the 1981-2 recession.

As I said then, there’s a definite change in the character of recessions after the mid-1980s. Before then, recessions were basically brought on by the Fed, which raised interest rates sharply to curb inflation, causing a slump in housing. When the Fed decided that we had suffered enough, it let rates fall again, and there was a surge from pent-up housing demand. Morning in America!

Since then, however, inflation has been well under control, and booms have died of old age — or more precisely, they have died because of overbuilding and an excessive level of debt. The Fed is then in the position of trying to goose housing (which is the principal channel for monetary policy) even though housing may already be overbuilt (which was the point I was making, sarcastically, when I said long ago that the Fed has to create a housing bubble), and it is cutting rates from an initial level which isn’t that high. So the odds of running up against the zero lower bound are high, and recovery can be a long time in coming….

The early-80s slump was brought on by a huge rise in the Fed funds rate, which left lots of room for cuts, and was driven by a deep slump in housing, which meant that there was lots of pent-up demand when rates fell again. The 2007-? slump was brought on by the bursting of a housing and debt bubble, and left the Fed largely pushing on a string.

Noah Smith:

Noahpinion: Standard Republican narrative of history (John Taylor edition): According to John Taylor, the reason that the recovery from the 2008-9 recession has not been as rapid as the recovery from the 1981-2 recession is that Reagan's policies were better than Obama's policies:

We are not really recovering from the recession, at least not compared to the period after previous big recessions such as the early 1980s…. The reason is pretty clear. In the Wall Street Journal piece I refer to and quote from a memo written by President Reagan’s economic adviser George Shultz and others after the 1980 election. It laid out the long run economic strategy they recommended and which Reagan followed. Contrast that with the memo Larry Summers sent to President-elect Obama after the 2008 election, which is making the internet rounds. It laid out the short-run Keynesian policy Summers recommended and which Obama has followed. The big policy differences largely explain the big economic performance differences.

And what are those big policy differences? In the WSJ article, Taylor spends a lot of time making a general case for "economic freedom," but names only one concrete policy difference between Reagan and Obama: Reagan enacted permanent tax cuts, while Obama enacted temporary tax rebates (in the ARRA). Taylor argues that Reagan's permanent tax cuts represent policy based on predictability and stability, while Obama's policies represent short-term, unreliable interventions.

This is a very standard intellectual-Republican narrative of economic history. Which, again, does not mean it is wrong. But I do see some big problems with Taylor's analysis.

Problem 1: Reagan's permanent tax cuts were enacted in early 1981, before the steep recession. This means that any effect that those tax rates had on the 1983 recovery had to have come not from the policy change, but from the low tax rates that were in place. However, in 2010, thanks to the Bush tax cuts, stable permanent long-term income tax rates were lower under Obama than they were under Reagan. If low permanent tax rates caused a rapid recovery in 1983, why didn't even lower permanent tax rates cause a rapid recovery in 2010?

In other words, if the 1981-2 recession was fundamentally the same kind of event as the 2008-9 recession, then Taylor is concluding that Obama's temporary tax cuts (or other actions, such as saying bad things about "business") substantially prolonged the current slump. I suppose that is possible - it's a claim that many Republicans have repeated - but it seems like a difficult case to make. A lot harder of a case, in fact, than simply saying "Reagan's policies were better than Obama's."

Problem 2: There are other historical examples of deep recessions besides the one in the early 80s. When we compare policies and results between now and the Great Depression, for example, especially in Britain, we are tempted to reach conclusions very different from Taylor's. I'll outsource this part of the argument to Brad DeLong:

This many months after the start of the Great Depression, the British economy was rapidly converging back to its pre-depression level of production under Chancellor of the Exchequer Neville Chamberlain's policy of using stimulative policies to restore the price level to its pre-Great Depression trajectory.

By contrast, the Cameron-Osborne policies of expansion-through-austerity have produced a flatline for real GDP, and the odds are high that British real GDP is headed down again.

In less than a year, if current forecasts come true, the Cameron-Osborne Depression will not be the worst depression in Britain since the Great Depression, but the worst depression in Britain… probably ever.

So if you want to ascribe economic outcomes to broad differences in economic policy, why only look at the Reagan years? Why not look at the Depression? And why look only at the U.S. instead of at other countries as well?

Problem 3: The 2008-9 recession does not seem very comparable to the 1981-2 recession. For one thing, the early 80s recession immediately followed (and, most believe, was precipitated by) a huge hike in interest rates by the Federal Reserve (which was trying to beat inflation). That meant that as soon as rates were allowed to fall, the force that had spiked U.S. GDP growth would be removed. In contrast, the 2008-9 recession occurred during a period of historically low interest rates, which were dropped to zero shortly after the recession began. This left the Fed without its usual method of boosting GDP growth. Even more importantly, the difference also indicates that the "shocks" that caused the two recessions were fundamentally different - a policy shock in the case of the early 80s recession, but some other kind of shock in the case of the 2008-9 recession.

In other words, I think this simple standard Republican narrative does not fit the facts. It is tempting, especially for politically conservative economists, to conclude that Reagan's tax cuts made everything about the U.S. economy awesome, and that something done or said by the left-leaning Obama made everything go wrong. But that conclusion just doesn't square with the evidence that we see when we look out the window. I think a more complex narrative is needed.

Quote of the Day: January 27, 2012

2012-01-27T06:04:06-08:00

"The most obvious damage is to his prose. Whenever Hobsbawm enters a politically sensitive zone, he retreats into hooded, wooden language, redolent of Party-speak. “The possibility of dictatorship,” he writes in The Age of Extremes, “is implicit in any regime based in a single, irremovable party.” The “possibility”? “Implicit”? As Rosa Luxemburg could have told him, a single irremovable party is a dictatorship. Describing the Comintern’s requirement in 1932 that German Communists fight the Socialists and ignore the Nazis, Hobsbawm in his memoirs writes that “it is now generally accepted that the policy . . . was one of suicidal idiocy.” Now? Everyone thought it criminally stupid at the time and has thought so ever since—everyone, that is, except the Communists."

--Tony Judt: Reappraisals: Reflections on the Forgotten Twentieth Century

Liveblogging World War II: January 27, 1942

2012-01-27T06:03:07-08:00

Gen. DeWitt met with Gov. Culbert L. Olson to gain his support for relocation of the Japanese. Attorney Gen. Warren and L.A. Mayor Fletcher Bowron also demanded the Japanese be moved out.

A 2.8%/Year Real GDP Growth Rate in the Fourth Quarter: A 1.6%/Year Real GDP Growth Rate in 2011 4Q/4Q

2012-01-27T05:55:21-08:00

One reason for the drag is a -2.9%/year 4Q/4Q growth rate in government purchases. That took -0.6% off of 2011 growth right there--perhaps 0.9% with the multiplier...

Alexander Hamilton: America as "Grand Experiment"

2012-01-27T05:55:04-08:00

Ari writes:

The so-called Grand Experiment is a big lie. « The Edge of the American West: Or so it seems. No, I’m not talking about Joe Paterno again [spits]. I’m talking about the description of the United States as a Grand Experiment in democracy or sometimes as a lower-case grand experiment in democracy. I always assumed that one of the founders* said that, that it was a quote in other words. But no, it seems that’s not the case. Unless I’m missing something — which is entirely possible; no, really, it’s entirely possible — the whole thing is a charade.

How about this? Will it do?

Alexander Hamilton:

Federalist #9: It is impossible to read the history of the petty republics of Greece and Italy without feeling sensations of horror and disgust at the distractions with which they were continually agitated, and at the rapid succession of revolutions by which they were kept in a state of perpetual vibration between the extremes of tyranny and anarchy…. From the disorders that disfigure the annals of those republics the advocates of despotism have drawn arguments, not only against the forms of republican government, but against the very principles of civil liberty. They have decried all free government as inconsistent with the order of society, and have indulged themselves in malicious exultation over its friends and partisans. Happily for mankind, stupendous fabrics reared on the basis of liberty, which have flourished for ages, have, in a few glorious instances, refuted their gloomy sophisms. And, I trust, America will be the broad and solid foundation of other edifices, not less magnificent, which will be equally permanent monuments of their errors.

But it is not to be denied that the portraits they have sketched of republican government were too just copies of the originals from which they were taken. If it had been found impracticable to have devised models of a more perfect structure, the enlightened friends to liberty would have been obliged to abandon the cause of that species of government as indefensible. The science of politics, however, like most other sciences, has received great improvement. The efficacy of various principles is now well understood, which were either not known at all, or imperfectly known to the ancients. The regular distribution of power into distinct departments; the introduction of legislative balances and checks; the institution of courts composed of judges holding their offices during good behavior; the representation of the people in the legislature by deputies of their own election: these are wholly new discoveries, or have made their principal progress towards perfection in modern times. They are means, and powerful means, by which the excellences of republican government may be retained and its imperfections lessened or avoided…

And there is always:

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure…. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us -- that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain -- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

Mortgage Crisis Criminal Investigations Unit

2012-01-26T19:01:00-08:00

Simon Johnson:

Breakthrough: Eric Schneiderman To Chair Mortgage Crisis Unit: As reported first in the Huffington Post, President Obama is creating “a special unit to investigate misconduct and illegalities that contributed to both the financial collapse and the mortgage crisis”. This will be chaired by Eric Schneiderman, the New York attorney general. For more background on why this makes sense and could represent a major policy breakthrough, please see this column: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0112/71788.html