Ann Pettifor – 11th June 2009 – For the Guardian Online.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/jun/12/recession-economic-crisis
A banker, Alan Clarke of BNP Paribas, citing a NIESR report, confidently tells the Guardian that the recession is over. Should we take the word of any banker – especially one that claims to be an economist – seriously?
Given that the economics profession was blind-sided by the ‘debtonation’ of 9th August, 2007, I am deeply sceptical. Second, given that this is a banker-induced recession; that reckless and often fraudulent behaviour by bankers led to a loss of $60 trillion of yours and my wealth (in the form of pensions, equities, lost interest on savings, and lost income from job losses) last year, should we believe a banker’s particular spin on the crisis?
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Ann Pettifor – 12th May 2009
Have just returned from a flying visit to Iceland, where I was mightily impressed by the warmth and strength of the Icelandic character. Also struck by the pride Icelanders have in the way the financial crisis deepened and strengthened their democracy – leading to the ousting of a corrupt government, and the election of a progressive coalition.
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by Ann Pettifor This is a short piece that appears in the Guardian today, 27 March 2009.
“Next week, at the G20 summit, G8 leaders will work very hard to defend and fortify globalisation – an economic system that has brought about the first flly synchronised global economic failure.
Even as they plan the meeting, the G8 seem to have run out of steam. There are suggestions that enough has been done to defend globalisation and steer the global economy back to stability. The remedies considered adequate are: unfettered capital mobility (with limited regulation); inflation targeting; substantial bail-outs of the finance sector; the bolstering of the IMF and its policies: free trade in the face of global trade imbalances, and partial, if inadequate, fiscal stimuli.
In other words, the tried-and-failed policies that prolonged the Great Depression and that will inevitably fail again.
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Debtonation Readers: This is the full version of my latest blog for Huffington Post:15th March, 2009
Once a-ponzi time, millions worshiped at the feet of the Wizards of Finance. These Wizards preached an economic religion that promised security and an abundance of riches from the ‘Emerald City’ — Wall St.
Investors following this religion were led to believe that they could make capital gains effortlessly and endlessly.
To make these gains, it was argued, there was no need for protection from the authorities. 401(k) plans were safe in the hands of the Wizards. There was also no need for investors to engage in hard work: to invest in research; to engage more labor; to sweat at making goods or delivering services.
There would be no need to save. Money would be made effortlessly.
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8th December, 2008
My piece in today’s Guardian, The Credit Crisis Myth, was resoundingly rubbished in many of the comments. Reminds me of when my book, The Coming First World Debt Crisis came out in 2006… Then it was: Chicken Licken – The sky is falling!
Read the article (and comments)
6th December 2008
The tears of millions of Americans stripped of livelihoods and healthcare remain hidden from view, unlike the tearful special pleading of the unscrupulous leaders of the finance sector, and this week, of the auto industry CEO’s. The latest unemployment numbers to emerge from the Dept. of Labor imply immense pain and anguish; and emotional, mental, familial and even social breakdown. For those of us in other G8 countries cushioned by a public health service that is still, mercifully, largely free, it is hard to imagine how Americans cope with the shock of losing a job, and also their health care. As we await Barack Obama’s inaugural speech, Franklin D. Roosevelt’s 1933 speech becomes more and more striking for its relevance. I have used it often, but do so again, unashamedly.
But first, a brief whinge: on successive visits to the US, I have struggled to get biographies and speeches by FDR. I hope that is changing. US citizens should be proud of the fact that a time of grave global financial crisis, when Europe moved to the right, towards fascism, the United States, under Roosevelt’s leadership, moved in a progressive direction.
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Open Democracy: 27th October 2008
It is a small measure of the dramatic financial meltdown of 2007-08 that leading representatives of western liberal capitalism ransacked the past for reference-points to convey its scale…
Read more here
I wrote a piece on Keynes and monetary policy for the Standard, which appeared on Thursday, 23rd October, 2008. You can read it below. Today a group of monetarist economists , supported by a range of bankers, have written to the Telegraph objecting to a public works programme to help economic recovery. They are right that excessive liabilities on the government’s balance sheet could cause interest rates to rise, but government spending has a multiplier effect, and very quickly pays for itself. They seem unaware of this economic fact. There is some overlap between our views on monetary policy as an effective tool, but I disagree with their view that UK government spending has been excessive.
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24th October, 2008
The NS has published a short piece this week: “Economists simply would not accept that their model could fail“. An introductory sentence is not mine: “Who would have predicted..that prudent Gordon Brown (would) breach the EU cap on government spending?” Am writing to the NS to ask for a correction to be published.
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22nd October, 2008.
I am dictating this piece down the phone from Budapest in Hungary where I have just arrived to deliver a lecture to the Ybl Club. My hosts were in a state of shock on arrival because the central bank of Hungary has just raised interest rates from 8.5% to 11.5%…
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Welcome to my blog about the financial crisis. I'm Ann Pettifor, author and analyst of the global financial system, and co-author of the Green New Deal. I predicted an Anglo-American debt-deflationary crisis back in 2003, and am known for my work on sovereign debt and international finance, including Jubilee 2000. Currently a fellow of the