The Future of Finance: The LSE Report

As a regular visitor and occasional contributor to irisheconomy.ie I’m surprised that there has been hardly any acknowledgement – just Brian Lucey – and no discussion of The Future of Finance and its relevance to informing discussion of the “blanket bank guarantee”, its economic and social costs, and the future of regulation here. My area of expertise is not financial economics but the book and particularly the associated downloadable presentations from the authors would seem necessary reading for all concerned with these issues. For those, who have not had a chance to look through the book, there is coverage of Ireland – one of four case studies considered in Chapter 10 along with Iceland, Canada and the Eurozone. One could pick many of the interesting observations made about the response to the banking crisis here but these two will do for now:

On its current program, each Irish family of four will be liable for 200,000 euros in debt by 2015. … There is no doubt that social welfare systems and healthcare, plus education spending, will decline sharply. The calamity of the Irish banking system will be felt for decades. (262)

….If the Irish continue with these policies, then in a few years time the nation will be burdened with levels of debt that exceed most of these ever seen in history for sovereign nations. (263).

I note a lot of discussion of “corner turning” in recent contributions here. On the basis of the above observations the question arises what direction are we heading?

(The blank spaces above didn’t come out–I’m sure you got the idea)