“The central irony of financial crises is that they’re caused by too much borrowing, too much confidence and too much spending and they’re solved by more confidence, more borrowing and more spending,” he said. But “people see economic issues through moral frames and people think there’s an extent to which recessions are punishment for sins — mainly sins of excess — and you don’t expiate sins by binges. So there’s a kind of moral counterintuitiveness that has made it difficult for the public and for political figures to accept stimulus.”

Larry Summers, quoted by Ezra Klein

Another downfall to having such a religious culture, I think - people tend to look at large amoral entities like the national economy and still see them through a moral lens.

Recessions aren’t punishments for bad behavior. You can’t repent your way out of one. 

Source: Washington Post

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  1. froggeek posted this