Levy Conference review
by George M. Richvalsky
Apr 19 — Warren presented “Alternative Proposals for a U.S. Nonconvertible Currency Regime†[see “Levy Presentation†on another part of this site] on Friday, April 17, 2009 at a conference organized by the Levy Economics Institute [www.levy.org] of Bard College entitled The State of the U.S. and World Economies: Meeting the Challenges of the Financial Crisis. Ford Foundation provided support. The Levy Institute is a nonprofit, non partisan public policy research organization whose work is premised on the accounting identity Government Surplus/Deficit = Private Deficit/Surplus.
The conference was well attended with many luminous presenters including a Nobel Laureate, Federal Reserve Bank Presidents, famous authors, academics, economists and forecasters [see Levy Program also on this site].
Warren’s presentation came within a block of “in paradigm†speakers, Jamie Galbraith, Robert Parenteau and Randy Wray, all effective and to their point. Warren’s major thrust is that the US is not on a gold standard but rather a nonconvertible currency regime with a broader range of policy options that he proceeded to put forward. His conclusions [see presentation final page]: recession is over, the ugly way – caused by automatic stabilizers, additional proactive fiscal adjustments are only now kicking in with the subsequent recovery restoring the financial sector and housing markets, but high and lingering unemployment will contain real wages and direct real wealth towards rentiers and upper income individuals. I encourage you to review this year’s proceeding when they appear on the Levy website. I noticed that 2008s proceedings are still available.
Mike Norman, a blogger on Warren’s site and an effervescent radio and TV personality, attended Warren’s presentation and reports that he will shortly provide details about his new TV show. Congrats Mike!
Not only did I enjoy the conference’s content and socializing opportunities but I was also impressed by those organizations and personalities that share those views expressed by Warren on this site. Expanding economic policy options to achieve increased world prosperity is necessary NOW but only happens once the politicians and their advisors acknowledge the validity of these views. The question is, How do we get to that tipping point?
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