About For Books Firefighting: The Financial Crisis and Its Lessons Review

  • 4 years ago
https://ni.readpdfonline.xyz/?book=B07PV513CK
From the three primary architects of the American policy response to the worst economic catastrophe since the Great Depression, a magnificent big-picture synthesis--why it happened, how it was combatted, what was learned, where we are now--that also stands as a wonderful short primer on leadership through crisis.In 2018, Ben Bernanke, Tim Geithner and Hank Paulson came together to reflect on the lessons of the 2008 financial crisis ten years on. Originally they'd thought to distill their analysis into the introduction to a scholarly volume of essays on the subject by other people, but as they got into the work of unpacking their thinking they went much more deeply into the subject than they'd envisioned. Each has written his own memoir of the crisis and aftermath, but the process of harmonizing their three perspectives, like that of viewing a crime scene through three different security cameras, was illuminating and deeply useful. And too, so much good work by other people has been done on the crisis, and so much that had been confidential has been brought into the public record. All of this has been digested and incorporated by the authors into their reckoning here. As they write, "Ten years later, we thought it would be useful to look back at how the crisis unfolded, and the lessons that might help reduce the damage from future crises. We wanted to speak with one voice about what we did together and what we learned together, about the theory and practice of financial firefighting. We have very different backgrounds and very different personalities. We did not know each other well before the crisis. But we stayed on the same page during the crisis, and we're still on the same page as we look back. We're worried that some of the key lessons of 2008 are already fading from memory, and that the next crisis could burn even hotter."A candid reckoning, warts and all, with an inevitably flawed human response in real-time to one of the most acute systemic crises in American history, FIREFIGHTING offers much to reflect upon about what might have been done better, and what still could be done to make us safer than we are. But above all, this is a powerful exemplary tale about the necessity of government to backstop global capitalism, and the possibility of dedicated public servants from both parties coming together at a time of crisis to extinguish a fire that threatened to burn our country, and indeed the world economy, down to its foundations. Though the politics were often gruesome, that was in no small part because few understood just how much worse it could get. All three authors view the crisis as the defining moment of their very distinguished careers; FIREFIGHTING will stand as their definitive joint statement on its lessons.

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