Observations From the Past 3.5 Years

by Mike Kimel

Observations From the Past 3.5 Years

Being alive in the past 3.5 years provides the following lessons:

1. Significant elements of the government, influenced to one or another degree by private sector lobbying and contributions, have done a poor job at leading the country.
2. Significant elements of the financial industry, influenced to one or another degree by government rules and regulations, have done a poor job of investing assets.
3. Significant elements of the home buying public, influenced to one degree or another by government policy and the financial sector, have done a poor job at buying houses.
4. Significant elements of the economics profession, influenced to one degree or other by ideology and a mercenary mindset, have done a poor job of understanding the economy.

That raises a few questions:

a. Is there any way to show that of the elements described above, the private sector or public sector is more or less inefficient at what they do?
b. Of the elements described above, which of those that failed at what they did on average, have paid or will pay a price, and which of those that failed at what they did, on average, have or will “failed upwards?”
c. Given b, which of the elements described above can be counted on to create a “next time around” or of making that next time around worse?