Kevin Dowd

I see the current financial crisis as due to a combination of a long and very sorry history of misguided government intervention and the failures of what passes for ‘financial risk management’.

My ‘take’ on the crisis is therefore anti-bailout, anti-‘stimulus’ and, indeed, anti-Keynesian. Bad policies are a major cause of the crisis, bad policies have needlessly aggravated and prolonged it, and bad policies threaten to do much more damage yet ...

My views on the crisis are to be found in “Moral hazard and the financial crisis” and in my Chris Tame memorial lecture, “Lessons from the financial crisis: a libertarian perspective”. (Chris Tame was a very good friend of mine.) My Tame lecture also sets out what I think should be done about it ... A later talk at the Paris Freedom Fest, “The Current Financial Crisis ... and After” (plus slides) in September 2009 gives a longer term prognosis.

Articles

“The Current Financial Crisis ... and After.” Talk to the Paris Freedom Fest, September 13, 2009. [Slides here.]

“Reawakening the Inflationary Monster: US Monetary Policy and the Federal Reserve." (K. Dowd and M. Hutchinson). Forthcoming in R. Kolb (Ed.) Lessons from the Financial Crisis: Insights and Analysis from Today’s Leading Minds, Wiley. [Draft 24 July 2009]

“Government Failure Caused the Financial Crisis.” (J. Alexander, M. Beenstock, P. Booth, E. Butler, Tim Congdon, L. Copeland, K. Dowd, J. Greenwood, S. Gregg, J. Kay, D. Llewellyn, A. Morrison, D. R. Myddelton and G. Wood) Daily Telegraph, May 14, 2009.

“The Failure of Capital Adequacy Regulation”. Pp.73-80 in P. Booth (ed) Verdict on the Crash, London: Institute of Economic Affairs, April 2009.

“Lessons from the Financial Crisis: A Libertarian Perspective.” Expanded version of the Second Chris R. Tame Memorial Lecture delivered at the National Liberal Club, March 17th 2009. Libertarian Alliance Economic Notes 111. The presentation is available on the web here. This article was the feature of an article by Bjarni Olafsson in the Icelandic newspaper Morgunbladid Fimmtudagur, April 16th 2009.

“Moral Hazard and the Financial Crisis.” Cato Journal, Vol. 29, No. 1, (Winter 2009), pp. 141-166. The video presentation of this paper is on the web here at the 26th annual Cato Monetary Conference, November 19, 2008, Washington DC. [My presentation is that end of this session, but the other presentations are well worth watching.]

Letters and postings

“The Government's Second Bail-Out is a Poor Way to Save the Banking System.” Sunday Telegraph, January 25, 2009.

“It’s Time to Abolish Risk-Based Regulation.” Insurance Risk and Capital, December 19, 2008.

“Keynesian Over-spending Won't Rescue the Economy.” (Andrew Lilico, John Greenwood, Richard Jeffrey, Ruth Lea, Trevor Williams, Nigel Allington, Philip Booth, Tim Congdon, Laurence Copeland, Kevin Dowd, Kent Matthews, Alan Morrison, Sir Alan Peacock, Mark Pennington, David B. Smith, Peter Spencer) Sunday Telegraph October 25, 2008.

“Northern Rock Managers like Captain of Titanic.” Financial Times October 19, 2007.

“Better to Have Thrown Northern Rock to the Wolves.” Financial Times September 19, 2007.

Source: Kevin Dowd