If true, I don't think it has much to do with working with Obama. Maybe he sees that it is impossible to continue to delay the inevitable, and that he would rather be remembered as the guy that "saved" the financial system and the US from economic ruin. Which is something the next Fed chief won't be able to do.
Bernanke out, Volcker in?
- Thread starter benwm
- Start date
If that were so, wouldn't he declare he doesn't want another term?
That's akin to admitting all you did was place a GIANT bandaid on this mess.
Better to be "forced" out and watch the wreckage from afar. At least then, some people will always have a second thought: "Well maybe if we kept Bernanke...."
Would you want to be FED chief? I wouldn't. Doing the right thing or the wrong thing is irrelevant. The next guy has two choices:
1) Kill the economy by allowing the deleveraging process to play out and wreak havoc on the economy, or
2) Kill the dollar, which will wipe out many people's wealth.
Is there really any other option?
Who wants to pull that trigger? Yesterday I watched a presentation to Google employees by the Australian economist Steve Keen - a Minsky follower. He said that we should have had a mini depression in 1987. Since 1987, we have been delaying, and magnifying, the inevitable (deleveraging). There's some truth to that - well, maybe, a whole lotta truth to that.
All true. And the impression I got even before he got the job was that the wanted to be "the big cheese" sooooooo badly, he was willing to do ANYTHING.
So do we "take our medicine" and all the pain that goes with it, or do others shove the medicine down our throats ($USD collapse*) and we take the pain which goes with THAT?
*won't be "wipe out many people's wealth", but rather wipe out ALMOST EVERYBODY'S WEALTH... and America will become owned by "others"..
Our current fiscal problems are tailor made for his educational background. My guess is he wants the job minus the politics. for all we know it could be showdown time between Congress and the politicizing on the Fed. Of course this is just conjecture, Bernanke needs to suck it up and play hard ball.
Whenever someone mentions that the Fed might be politicized, doesn't that assume that they are Not Already?
I mean, politicians are generally a scurvy lot, and they always come up as a group to blame for the mess, but the fact that the Fed never seems to stand in the way of them doing/spending whatever they want - then what good does the Fed do anyway? They aren't stopping messes from happening (yes, there's always the "Make me Emperor and bad crashes will never happen" argument).
Saying "Oh, yes, they cave in to the politicos all the time, but it would be worse without them." - has no basis in fact and is just empty conjecture.
Of course, there are plenty of articles saying Greenspan created the bubble in the first place or at least stoked it...
I mean, politicians are generally a scurvy lot, and they always come up as a group to blame for the mess, but the fact that the Fed never seems to stand in the way of them doing/spending whatever they want - then what good does the Fed do anyway? They aren't stopping messes from happening (yes, there's always the "Make me Emperor and bad crashes will never happen" argument).
Saying "Oh, yes, they cave in to the politicos all the time, but it would be worse without them." - has no basis in fact and is just empty conjecture.
Of course, there are plenty of articles saying Greenspan created the bubble in the first place or at least stoked it...