Completely Disconnected

In a few hours we again head north to another remote campground in the Sierra Nevada Mountains. At almost 8000 feet, with few neighbors and a new moon, it should be a quiet, enjoyable weekend. Completely disconnected from the world - no internet, no television, no cell phone - we will find out what has changed in the world when we return on Monday.

This has been a harrowing week for many - the news from the Gulf Coast seems to get worse with each passing hour. We hope that the situation is brought under control in New Orleans and that rescue workers can safely get to those in need of assistance. A Red Cross link has been added to the right, if you are so inclined.

It has been an unproductive week here, but we'll attempt to correct that starting next Tuesday.

We leave you with two items. The first is a cartoon by Tom Toles at the Washington Post, which we've taken the liberty of reprinting here in the hope that it will help us get back into the swing of things next week:


Mr.Toles has many other fine cartoons available in his archive, here's one on the housing bubble.

The second is a repeat of a post which most readers have probably not seen - this first appeared almost five months ago when only a few people stopped by. When wondering what might have gone on yesterday as George W. Bush, Alan Greenspan, and the White House economic team met, then searching for one of our favorite Economist articles, we stumbled across this post, read it, and found that the vim and vigor that have been so lacking this week were there, just waiting to be called upon again when needed in a pinch such as this.

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Past, Present, and Future
April 11, 2005

They were all in the news in the last few days - Paul Volcker, Alan Greenspan, and Ben Bernanke - the past, present, and likely future Chairmen of the banking cartel more commonly known as the Federal Reserve. Volcker was screaming at the top of his lungs "Somebody do something - Now! Before this thing explodes!". Greenspan was pondering his legacy, while at the same time trying to distance himself from the GSEs. And, young Ben was just giddy - with the prospect of hanging out with Dubya and Dick and the rest of the Bush economic dream team, until it's time for him to take the con at the FRB and show us what he really meant when he said "helicopter money". Let's recap.

Paul Volcker (Fed Chairman from 1979 to1987)

So , what did Mr. Volcker have to say this week? Let's see ... last year he said "unless America changes course, there is a '75 percent' chance of an economic crisis in the next five years". This due to various global imbalances - international trade, savings rates, currency ... you know the story. Has his view changed at all in recent months? Well, I guess yesterday's Washington Post article An Economy On Thin Ice answers that question:

"Yet, under the placid surface, there are disturbing trends: huge imbalances, disequilibria, risks -- call them what you will.Altogether the circumstances seem to me as dangerous and intractable as any I can remember, and I can remember quite a lot. What really concerns me is that there seems to be so little willingness or capacity to do much about it."

Uh ... Paul, this is the second paragraph, and you're like, all gloom and doom already - come on, flip on CNBC or one of those swell Fox business shows, and get with the program. Baby boomers not saving, spending like there's no tomorrow, home ownership as a vehicle for borrowing ... la la la la la la la - I'm not listening.

Now, about half way through, Paul seems to come to his senses a bit:

"Some, such as China, depend heavily on our expanding domestic markets. And for the most part, the central banks of the emerging world have been willing to hold more and more dollars, which are, after all, the closest thing the world has to a truly international currency."

Yes, that's right - we are the hegemon, they need us, they would be nobodies without us - Japan, China, South Korea, and the rest of them. And, this will go on for as long as we say so ... end of story ... you can stop now.

"The difficulty is that this seemingly comfortable pattern can't go on indefinitely ... The clear lesson I draw is that there is a high premium on doing what we can to minimize the risks and to ensure that there is time for orderly adjustment. I'm not suggesting anything unorthodox or arcane. What is required is a willingness to act now -- and next year, and the following year, and to act even when, on the surface, everything seems so placid and favorable. What I am talking about really boils down to the oldest lesson of economic policy: a strong sense of monetary and fiscal discipline."

Well, you've really gone off the deep end now - you should have stopped when you were talking about how great we are compared to those Asian fellas. Not sure where you're going with this - "willingness to act now", "monetary and fiscal discipline"? I've read about this stuff ... just what decade are you from man? Oh, that's right, you're the guy who raised interest rates to about 20% back in the 80's when we had out-of-control oil prices, gas prices, and housing prices, and gold was like $800 an ounce ... uh ... but this is completely different now.

Alan Greenspan (Fed Chairman from 1987 to 2006)

Last week, almost the entire week was devoted to Alan Greenspan (see here, here, and here) - oil, Fannie and Freddie, consumer credit. To summarize: oil - hopefully not a problem, Fannie and Freddie - maybe a problem, and consumer credit - just can't get enough of the stuff. OK, done - now let's dig a little deeper, take a look back, see if we can figure out what Volcker's all bent out of shape about.

What can you really say about the last eighteen years - about the credit and money creation machine that has been built during the Greenspan years? In the mid nineties, we were helping to save the rest of the world from one financial crisis after another. Then in the late nineties, all of Wall Street was getting rich through the miracle of rising asset prices (equities this time) and traders worshipped little Greenspan dolls before the opening bell - Stuart and his boss "lit the candle" which was his new Amertrade account.

Never being able to identify an asset bubble while it was forming, the equities mania of the late nineties, that culminated in the bursting of the Nasdaq bubble in 2000, morphed with relative ease into a bubble in a different asset class (real estate this time). Real estate prices have been rising parabolically in the last few years, much like equities did years before. Although recently there has been an acknowledgement of "signs" of a housing bubble in "some areas", it's clear that in many parts of the country houses are being flipped like dot.com shares and pre-construction sales have taken the place of internet IPOs.

Interest rates at historically low levels, liquidity like Niagra Falls, and nary a sign of inflation (until recently), or trade deficit problems (until recently), or budget deficits problems (until recently). Eighteen years of unprecedented economic expansion, prosperity, wealth creation, and ... money creation.

That's right, none of this would be possible without pushing what was then a surprisingly respectable, pure fiat currency system left by Paul Volcker, to its maximum potential, using ever shrinking reserve requirements, ever lower interest rates, and other stuff like this and this that no one is supposed to know about. With one Asian country after another selling us cheap, high quality consumer goods to keep measured inflation at reasonable levels, it was a no brainer - just keep lowering interest rates for 18 years and see how many friends you can make!

No wonder Paul Volcker sounds a little bitter these days.

Volcker put an unstable pure fiat currency system back onto a path that could be sustained for some period of time - he brought on the pain, only to be upstaged when the Greenspan money creation circus came to town.

For the last deade or so, Greenspan has fooled many of us, but he certainly hasn't fooled these two men - Kurt Richebacher:

"In actual fact, in the past few years, the Greenspan Fed has systematically and deliberately fostered parabolic credit and financial excess with the explicit purpose of inflating asset prices. What manifestly is duping most people is the fact that the bulk of the credit excess poured into asset prices and the soaring trade deficit, rather than into the CPI, as had been usual."

And Hans Sennholz:

"The popular notion that an increase in the stock of money is socially and economically beneficial and desirable is one of the great fallacies of our time. It has lived on throughout the centuries, embraced by kings and presidents, politicians and businessmen. It has shattered numerous currencies, inflicted incalculable harm, and caused social and political upheavals. It springs forth again and again, no matter how often economists may refute it. American statisticians and economists want to make us believe that America is a new-paradigm exception in this respect, being miraculously able to generate unprecedented productivity growth with zero savings and record low fixed business investment. The consensus readily believes it. For us, this is macro economic rubbish"

Many more will write about the Greenspan Fed this year and next - expect to hear more from Paul Volcker as Greenspan's retirement draws nearer.

Ben Bernanke (Fed Chairman from 2006 - ?)

Ben hasn't been talking much lately - this is the quiet period before his public offering to Congress in the form of confirmation hearings for the post of White House Council of Economic Advisers. He is considered the favorite to become the new Federal Reserve Chairman next year, but first he needs to spend some time at the White House, where the economic future of the civilized world is being meticulously planned. The whole idea of borrowing money from the rest of the world to goose the stock market for the next decade (also known as Social Security reform) doesn't seem to be getting the traction that it needs - perhaps Ben can help with that.

But, Ben needs to be careful as he speaks more in public as part of his new duties at the White House - after many years of Greenspan Fedspeak, there is a danger of Ben stumbling out of the gate, saying something that might be misinterpreted, and having a destablilizing effect on markets:

"Bernanke possesses one credential crucial for any Greenspan replacement: The ability to translate econo-speak into plain language. "Bush is going to want to appoint someone who can sit down with him and speak in a language he understands," Beach said."

I'm not sure that's such a good idea - plain language about this economy from top government officials - using an approach of "simple solutions to complex problems" that has worked so well in foreign policy these last few years. Will this work when it comes to today's economy ... instead of nuances and hedges and equivocations that we've all gotten used to in the last eighteen years? Better think about that a bit.

Well, we'll have lots more to say about Mr Bernanke in the coming months, as the retirement party planning gathers pace. Ben will surely try to rid himself of his "helicopter money" label and we'll see just what he has in store for us after he starts work at the White House.

It does seem strange, though, when you look at the state of affairs when Volcker turned things over to Greenspan in 1987, versus what things will probably look like in less than a year, when Greenspan calls it quits - they say timing is everything, and Ben will probably learn that lesson the hard way.

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Katrina: Reaction and Reporting

Still having a hard time getting back to doing what we normally do here, and building up a bit of a backlog on Federal Reserve commentary after last week's "vertical obituary" at Jackson Hole, we find ourselves again today thinking about the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina - how affected people are coping with it, how the rest of us are reacting to it, and how the media is covering it.

The news keeps getting worse - loss of life and grim predictions of more to come from the mayor of New Orleans, lawlessness, reports of uniformed police officers taking part in the looting, suspended evacuation plans for hospitals and the Superdome due to gunshots, gas price shocks, oil rigs missing - it all seems pretty overwhelming.

All this doesn't seem to stop a lot of people, far removed from the Gulf Coast, from treating these events as just more information to be included in another economic analysis or prediction.

Is it just me or shouldn't others be having at least some difficulty going on with their daily routine of commenting on the economy? After Katrina, will the Fed pause? How high will oil go? In particular, it seems that the analysis of the potential impact of Katrina on the general health of the American economy could at least wait until the "Thousands Feared Dead" headline has been removed from the Yahoo! main page. It doesn't seem sufficient to provide a disclaimer, "Our thoughts are with those who have been affected by Hurricane Katrina ...", and then go on to expound on why the 2006 recession will draw nearer as a result.

While Ben Bernanke unconvincingly tried to assure the nation that the wider impact of Katrina will be "modest", the dollar swooned and then rumors swirled of some late day buying in S&P futures pits by buyer 990N. Confidence is key. Later in the day, stories about gasoline prices and gasoline shortages started popping up all over, and government officials quickly attacked the problem by making pronouncements to the contrary.

Parts of the cable and broadcast news media seem to be dumbstruck by the unfolding events.

A number of times now we've heard the on-air discussion, "Have you ever seen anything like this in this country?". Veteran reporters and in-studio hosts seem to be equally shocked that this is happening here. Why is that? Is it so hard to accept that the images from the Gulf Coast are not from some far away place? Are images of Americans as victims in America a reminder that in many ways we are not so different than others in far away places.

At times like this, when quickly changing channels to get the latest news, the difference in the quality of the news reporting becomes painfully clear. Frankly, we are not sure what to make of what we have heard and seen on some of the cable news channels. Not having spent much time watching this sort of news lately, some of it appears very strange - as if you can feel the desperation in the studio. Desperation not about the events they are covering, but about their own inability to make sense of it all while maintaining their composure.

When thinking back about how crises like this were reported in the past, the contrast is also clear. In simpler times when global threats were fewer and with less foreboding about what lies beneath an otherwise calm surface, there were different news personalities to guide us.

We long for the comforting voice of Peter Jennings and wish he was still with us to make sense of this all.

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Katrina

Today, we depart from our normal fare of trying to make sense of what central bankers do and how this affects the rest of world. Instead, we turn our attention to Hurricane Katrina.

After the storm veered to the east just before making landfall, initial indications were hopeful that the worst-case scenario had been avoided. Recent reports, however, suggest that this optimism was premature.

As talk began to heat up as to whether this could be the "tipping point" that pushed the American economy into recession, or how these events will affect fuel prices over the Labor Day weekend and beyond, or what impact this will have on the Gulf Coast gambling industry, we began to wonder about our priorities.

When cable news studio hosts prodded on-scene reporters for casualty estimates, and we awaited the response, we wondered if, in this electronic age, we have all gone a bit mad.

We wondered how commodity indexes and energy stocks would fare as the news was reported yesterday. As levees in New Orleans failed and water rushed in seeking the lower-lying poorer areas of town, we began to lose interest in the rising prices. As the devastation in Mississippi became clear, the impact on energy sector earnings seemed to matter less.

It is not often that you hear phrases like "pushed aside the dead to reach the living" during reporting of events in the United States. America is not accustomed to this sort of catastrophe. This sort of thing normally happens in far away places.

To the locals, the events of the last few days are life threatening or life altering - to most of the rest of us it is news. News closer to home, but nonetheless news. News that may affect us.

Have we all become desensitized? Should we be less sensitive? More sensitive?

To our forefathers, death and destruction were much more common - they were desensitized to this sort of thing, and for good reason. We are desensitized for different reasons and in different ways - because it is so common and so far away - only knowable through a CRT or an LCD. Easy to turn on and off, yet so much more of it to see.

Today we question how we think about events such as this and we wonder about the future.

To donate to the American Red Cross, click here.

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Zakaria and Will on Greenspan

On Sunday's This Week with George Stephanopoulos, Fareed Zakaria and George Will debated the enduring qualities of Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan while Cokie Roberts mostly looked on and listened. The discussion between Zakaria and Will is of interest for a number of reasons, most of which have to do with propaganda (for lack of a better word) and perception.

Well, actually, propaganda is the right word - the spreading of ideas, information, or rumor for the purpose of helping or injuring an institution, a cause, or a person. That pretty much describes the government statistics for growth, unemployment, and inflation that keep getting hammered into the collective consciousness of the American people by government officials and Wall Street economists - 3.4%, 5.0% and 3.2%, respectively.

With the advent of high oil prices and the cresting of the housing boom with its attendant wealth creation, propaganda and perception now seem to be diverging daily - people are starting to take notice.

Neither Zakaria nor Will are economists. That in itself is novel. Two learned news personalities discussing the tenure of Alan Greenspan and the state of the economy without any references to "slack" or Phillips Rules or Phillips Curves, or is it Taylor?

Will from one side, Zakaria from the other. Larry Kudlow and Paul Krugman, without the statistics and the econospeak.

When it comes to matters of the economy and finance, Will is obviously a bit detached from reality - we've never heard anyone refer to Alan Greenspan as someone with a singular mission to "preserve the currency as a store of value" - until Sunday that is. Zakaria, on the other hand seems to prefer the role of Toto, pulling back the curtain which has kept an ordinary Wizard out of plain sight. He really does a pretty good anti-Greenspan tour de force in just five sentences.

It's funny - the more people talk about the Greenspan legacy, the more a common theme emerges, "He's done a fine job under some very trying conditions, but this housing bubble could destroy us all". Fareed follows this model and was just getting to the destruction part (we think) before Stephanopolous cut him off.

Cokie Roberts' comments toward the end of this segment are probably more significant than anything any of the men had to say - and much scarier. The idea that Alan Greenspan is one of the most trusted and authoritative men in the land (Cokie's words), and that, by extension, he is presumed to have done what is in the best interest of the people who have entrusted him (my words), is truly scary.

Here's the transcript:

Stephanopoulos: Let's turn to Alan Greenspan. There's a Washington fixture finishing up 18 years on the Federal Reserve - there's a conference out at Jackson Hole this week, and devoted to his legacy as he wraps up, as his term runs out.

Roberts: That's what's called a vertical obituary.

Stephanopoulos: It runs out at the end of January, we should have a new Fed Chairman on January 31st, and George Will, the consensus at least at the conference that he is presiding over is, that he is about the best Fed Chairman in our history.

Will: It is difficult to remember, but well to remember that thirty years ago, the learned journals were full of articles on the ungovernability of democracies, particularly this one. The index of ungovernability was inflation. It was supposed to be the systemic disease of democracies, they could not help but cause it by excessive spending over taxing, and once it started they didn't have a pain threshold sufficient to wring it out of the system. Now that was a theory culled by a fact, the Reagan-Volcker wringing out of inflation. But we don't worry about inflation anymore, because he's worried about very little else. He said as head of the Fed, I'm not there to fine tune the growth rate, I'm not here to fine tune the unemployment rate, I'm here to preserve the currency as a store of value - do that, eliminate that great uncertainty, and America boomed.

Stephanopoulos: But his key insight, Fareed, was that productivity was growing so fast that you didn't have to worry about inflation all that much.

Zakaria: I would argue a rather small dissent here. I would say that it's not Alan Greenspan that's killed inflation; it's China and India, the two great global deflation machines, pricing goods and services so much lower than elsewhere in the world. Look, Greenspan has done a remarkable job under very difficult circumstances, but what I'm struck by is when we go around the world, we tell places like Germany and Japan, "Your problem with your kind of capitalism is you can't take any pain". Inefficiencies build up in capitalism and you've got to be able to take pain to wring them out of the system. But, what we've had here is Dr. Feelgood giving us the lowest interest rates in a generation and we have coasted our way out of these problems by racking up enormous consumer debt, by racking up huge mortgages, by creating a stock market bubble, and then a housing bubble.

Stephanopoulos: That's more than a mild dissent!

Zakaria: There's a famous definition of the Fed Chairman as being the guy who takes the punchbowl away just as the party has begun. Alan Greenspan has spiked the punchbowl with grain alcohol!

Roberts: But, he actually, at this conference is warning about hard times ahead as the housing bubble bursts and consumer spending ...

Zakaria: But who created the housing bubble?

Roberts: But I think there were a couple of very interesting moments here. I think that Alan Greenspan might be the last person on earth maybe at the moment, whom everyone trusts. He is a voice of authority who people turn to and listen to, and markets respond, and politicians respond, and we're past that point with politicians, I would argue we're past that point with anchors on the air.

Stephanopoulos: He is a very canny politician. He has at times sort of signaled, "I'm OK" with the Bush tax cuts; he got some criticism for that. At other times he said, "No, no, you've gone too far". He knows the game he's playing.

Will: But he's famously Delphic also. He's impenetrable.

Zakaria: He was not Delphic on the Bush tax cuts.

Roberts: He said that you needed triggers that kicked in according to the economy and the fact that they didn't have them ...

Zakaria: He's smart enough to know what the political effect was of that qualifier.

Will: His wife said he had to propose three times before she understood him. And he famously said, "If I have made myself clear, I have misspoken". The simple truth is, we're about to go into a terrific fight over the Supreme Court. We worry about that because it's unelected people exercising judicial review and power. Much more important to us is the power of the Federal Reserve, where for 18 years this man has served.

Stephanopoulos: And that decision is going to move markets. We have to end it there. Coming up is...

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How Do We Get Out of This Alive?

You can get a pretty good feel for the general mood at the Kansas City Fed's annual central bank symposium held over the weekend in Jackson Hole, Wyoming just by scanning the headlines of the articles that were written. Links to most of these appeared in yesterday’s post.

During a conference with a theme of "Greenspan's Legacy", many headlines contained phrases such as "problems await", "economic risks", "if the bubble bursts", “uncharted waters”, and “market trauma” among others. This seems to indicate a real sense of unease on the part of many writers filing stories related to this event.

Looking through these articles, and counting Paul Krugman’s late entry on Sunday, there were a total of four headlines which included the word “bubble” - one from the L.A. Times, two from Bloomberg, and Krugman’s editorial which appears in today’s N.Y. Times.

In the fifty articles in yesterday’s list from major news reporting organizations (i.e., everything from the group of Reuters stories at the top, down to the one from Investors Business Daily) there were 128 instances of the word “bubble”. That’s about two-and-a-half instances per story, with the heaviest concentration in the N.Y. Times, L.A. Times, and Bloomberg stories. Interesting. A quick scan for the word “burst”, revealed 18 instances. Also interesting.

Like the conference itself, many of the stories focused on the legacy of Alan Greenspan.

All of these stories included words of praise for the sustained economic growth and low inflation experienced during this time, but they also included unanswered questions about what will become of the housing bubble and how it will affect the rest of the economy. Most telling of these legacy articles is the one by long-time Fed watcher Greg Robb of CBS MarketWatch where he chose to end his piece with a quote which is the title of this post (see excerpt below).

We are working on our own story about the Greenspan legacy - more on that later this week. In the meantime, here are some selected excerpts from the reporting over the weekend:

Reuters - Glenn Somerville
Fed eyes asset-price rises closely-Greenspan

"Such an increase in market value is too often viewed by market participants as structural and permanent," said the 79-year-old, who is due to step down as the U.S. central bank's chairman at the end of January.

"To some extent, those higher values may be reflecting the increased flexibility and resilience of our economy," he said.

But he added "newly abundant liquidity can readily disappear" if investors grow wary for some reason and demand a higher risk premium for lending.

New York Times - Edmund L. Andrews
Greenspan Says Housing Boom Is Nearly Over

He also acknowledged more strongly than before that the housing boom, which has been fueled in large part by the Fed's own decision to prop up the economy with low interest rates, is closely tied to the nation's soaring trade deficit and its record level of foreign indebtedness.

But Mr. Greenspan also seemed intent on defending his legacy against critics who say his policies contributed to the United States' imbalances, which could lead to higher interest rates and potentially wrenching declines in housing prices and consumer spending.

Los Angeles Times - Bill Sing
If 'Bubble' Bursts, Legacy of Greenspan May Deflate

But the final chapter of Greenspan's legacy might be based on how well the central bank manages what many experts say is a crisis looming on the horizon: a housing bubble.

Many experts say the nation's real estate market draws disturbing similarities to stocks in the late 1990s — a market driven to unsustainable price levels by what Greenspan famously called "irrational exuberance." They fear a similar ending: a sharp fall in prices that could bite the net worth of many Americans and trigger a recession.

And some experts say Greenspan deserves at least some of the blame for fostering housing market conditions that the Fed chairman himself has called "frothy." The Fed, they say, hasn't done enough to damp real estate speculation, while maintaining cheap credit for too long.

CBS MarketWatch - Greg Robb
The measure of the chairman

Many economists think Greenspan made a policy mistake by accommodating and even encouraging asset bubbles that developed in the stock market and later in the housing market. Greenspan has argued that the policymakers can't know it's a bubble until after it has burst and can only then react to it.
...
"Greenspan should weigh against asset markets in the good times -- just as he works to support them in the difficult times. He's been one-sided in his policies," said Zandi of Economy.com. Investors sense this and act on it, Zandi said.

In the current environment, the housing sector has been immune to the Fed rate hikes to date. Home prices have risen steadily and many consumers have been borrowing against this price appreciation. "The Fed has never said this borrowing is a mistake and that this is a problem," said Brusca of FAO Economics.

Many say the final assessment of Greenspan's tenure as Fed chairman will not be written until it is clear how the possible housing market bubble is resolved. Some economists said the Fed should "unleash the regulatory machinery" to rein in excesses in the mortgage and housing markets.

Economists are worried that low savings rate and the possibility that a sharp decline in housing prices could make the next economic downturn more severe.

"The question is, how do we get out of this alive?" said Robert Dederick, president of RGD Economics in Hinsdale, Ill.

At the moment, the only answer is that we'll have to do it without Greenspan.

Prudent Bear Credit Bubble Bulletin - Doug Noland
The Greenspan Era: Lessons to be Learned

No discussion of Greenspan’s possible legacy will stand the test of time without addressing the momentous financial sector developments nurtured under his watch. Ultimately, I expect that he will be judged most by the success or failure of the Financial Sphere he cultivated, sustained and endorsed. Curiously, I have yet to read or listen to any comments regarding the unprecedented buildup of debt under The Greenspan Regime. He has operated for too long as undisputed Master and Commander of what has evolved into today’s massive and unwieldy global pool of speculative finance. Disconcertingly, his impending exit will coincide with increasingly vulnerable U.S. Mortgage Finance and Credit Bubbles.

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Greenspan Overload

Someone's been in the news over the weekend ...

From the Central Bankers
Remarks by Chairman Alan Greenspan - Reflections on central banking
Remarks by Governor Donald L. Kohn
Monetary Policy and 'Credible Alertness' - Jean-Claude Trichet
Remarks by Chairman Alan Greenspan - Closing Remarks

Reuters - Glenn Somerville
Fed eyes asset-price rises closely-Greenspan
Rubin: problems await Greenspan successor
Greenspan heir must replace 'one-man band'-Blinder
Greenspan: end of housing boom inevitable
Markets should heed central banks-Kohn

Associated Press - Jeannine Aversa
Greenspan: Investments Won't Soar Forever
Greenspan Confident About His Successor
Greenspan: Housing Market Will Cool Off
Crisis Management Is Greenspan's Specialty
Greenspan issues warning

Washington Post - Nell Henderson
Jackson Hole Symposium -- 2005 Program
Rocky Mountain High Finance
Paper: Understanding the Greenspan Standard
Rubin Praises Stance Of Greenspan on Deficits
Greenspan Confident About Successors
Greenspan Cites Economic Risks For Consumers

New York Times - Edmund L. Andrews
The Doctrine Was Not to Have One
Greenspan Warns That Economic Risks Remain
Greenspan Chides Investors
Greenspan Says Housing Boom Is Nearly Over

Los Angeles Times - Bill Sing
If 'Bubble' Bursts, Legacy of Greenspan May Deflate
Fed Chief Warns on Housing Costs
Fed Chief's Comments, New Data Hit Stocks

Bloomberg - various
Ready for the Greenspan Hosannas? Here's Mine: Caroline Baum
Asset Bubbles or Bust -- What's the Fed to Do?
Greenspan Fans at Jackson Hole May Differ on View of Bubbles
U.S. Treasuries Fall on Greenspan Speech; Yield Curve Shrinks
Greenspan Successor May Limit `Explicit' Guidance, Study Says
Greenspan Says Housing Boom to `Simmer Down,' Prices May Fall
Fed's Kohn Defends Communicating Interest Rate Moves
Greenspan Says Fed Paying Attention to Asset Prices

CBS MarketWatch - Greg Robb
The measure of the chairman
Next Fed chief faces uncharted waters
Housing Boom is an Imbalance: Greenspan
Bernanke, Hubbard, Feldstein or ?
Oil prices biggest risk, Sinai says
Greenspan keeps secrets of success
Housing boom will 'simmer down'
Greenspan to have succession role

CNN/Money - Kathleen Hays
Greenspan: Hero? Or goat?
Greenspan: Rein in risk
Greenspan: Risks from deficits, housing

Financial Times - Andrew Balls
Greenspan warns on impact of asset prices
'Market trauma' warning when Greenspan goes
Greenspan warns on dangers in US housing market

Dallas Morning News - Danielle DiMartino
Greenspan Cites Warning Signs

Times Online - Graham Searjeant
US heading for house price crash, Greenspan tells buyers

U.S. News - Paul J. Lim
Greenspan's tenure: From bust to bust?

San Francisco Chronicle - Alan T. Saracevic
The real power guys -- Greenspan decipherers

Investors Business Daily - Kirk Shinkle
Greenspan Offers Cautious Outlook, Concerns On Debt

Prudent Bear Credit Bubble Bulletin - Doug Noland
The Greenspan Era: Lessons to be Learned

New Economist
Papers from the August 2005 Jackson Hole symposium
Dean Baker slams Greenspan's record

Economist's View
Greenspan Sums It Up
Fed Watch: Forecast Calls For More Rate Hikes
Robert Rubin Praises Greenspan’s Opposition to Deficits
Greenspan’s Closing Remarks

macroblog
The Top Ten Things We Have Learned From Alan Greenspan...

MaxSpeak, You Listen
GREENSPANFEST ’05: BE GLAD YOU WEREN’T INVITED

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