Decade of Sin

Peter Schiff, one of the contrarian economists who predicted the Crash and who remains very bearish, writes about Time Magazine's coverage of the last decade and naming of Bernanke as 'Person of the Year':

Apart from its misplaced reverence for the Fed Chairman, I would take issue with Time's entire characterization of what has now become history.

Under no circumstances could the past ten years be described as "the decade from hell." In fact, in terms of economic good fortune, the period shares parallels with the Roaring Twenties. I would describe this as a decade of sin that paved the way to hell.

Yes, we had spectacular problems like September 11th and the invasion of Iraq – which were horrific for those who were directly affected – but for most Americans, it was a time of unexpected wealth and unearned prosperity. Up to the days of the stock market crash, the economics of the decade will be remembered for cash-out refinancing for millions of homeowners, no-doc liar loans, no-money-down car purchases, eight-figure Wall Street bonuses, cheap Chinese imports, and trample-to-death holiday sales. In other words, the decade now closing gave us the biggest and most irresponsible spending orgy in U.S. history. The past decade was the party; the one ahead will be the hangover.

The fact that Time completely ignored these issues shows how poorly the mainstream media understands the forces bearing down on our economy. Yes, they were able to identify some of the adverse consequences we experienced this decade. That's the easy part. But as far as seeing the causes behind the effects, they haven't a clue. As a result, Time has no ability to see the underlying pattern and will happily encourage our leaders to repeat the mistakes of the past on a grander scale.

Perhaps rather than sin, I would use the term 'foolishness', because it was a very foolish decade.

Actually the last three decades have been foolish without letup, and I don't see much changing, unfortunately. Commentators have noted that Obama is simply trying to reboot the same system (with electric cars instead of gasoline powered ones), instead of fundamentally reforming the system. That would be my central critique of his first year, as opposed to the drift of his electoral campaigning.