Doug Henwood wrote: > Why is this guy getting reappointed? He let the bubble inflate, > dismissed worries about the dangers of subprime "mortgages and > derivatives, said in mid-2008 that the recession was unlikely to get > too serious (just as it was about to get very serious)—and then, when > everything fell apart, set about writing big big big giant big checks > to Wall Street. Yes, in a financial crisis, it’s essential that a > central bank flood the system with money to keep things from imploding > utterly. But he’s done so without any clear strategy or > accountability, and absolutely no commitment to insuring that it > doesn’t happen again. Truly the American ruling class is a rotting > social formation.
Bernanke in effect helped to cause the crisis (by allowing the bubble to go while) but then he's really good at using his knowledge of the Great Depression to prevent a new one from happening again (to the extent that he can). Besides he can keep the financiers calm because he's part of their club, complete with their antagonism toward Social Security and Medicare. And, besides, who would replace Bernanke?[*] So we might say that even though he's bad, we need him. Of course, it's the same with the financial system: they got us into trouble by pumping up the bubble with credit, increasingly deranged derivatives, and various bizarre mortgage scams for the lower middle class and upper poor. But we need them, since if we didn't throw money at them last year, the whole US economy would have went kerplooey. They were bad, but we need them. This is how power works: those with power in society make themselves necessary. The capitalist class was created via a long process of violence against working people (primitive accumulation) and have accumulated wealth by exploiting them, too. But we need to keep them because it we don't, the economy would go south very quickly. (especially since there's no mass working-class movement to take over the reins.) on a related subject: a colleague said something like the following to me recently: "on this whole issue of income inequality, would the increases be so bad if we took out the CEOs?" my response: "that would be a good idea." -- Jim Devine / "Segui il tuo corso, e lascia dir le genti." (Go your own way and let people talk.) -- Karl, paraphrasing Dante. [*] alas, I'm not available. _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
