Robert Shiller's latest "Finance in the 21st Century" column. http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/edit/archives/2003/08/11/2003063211
excerpt: Those who advocate running deficits often portray them as necessary to fix an economy in which confidence is draining away. Following John Maynard Keynes, they argue that running deficits will restore confidence before a recession or depression can take hold. But this is like putting a patient on Prozac before he becomes suicidal. Such arguments, although valid at times, have their limits. Japan's public deficits spawned a national debt of 140 percent of annual GDP, without producing any economic resurgence. Indeed, today's budget deficits reflect long-term problems that are not what Keynesian theory envisions. So discussions about deficits should be recast in terms of the really long-term intergenerational issues that matter. -- "Erik Reuter" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> http://www.erikreuter.net/ _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
