My losing battle against the leviathan - Faculty & Research

MY LOSING BATTLE AGAINST THE LEVIATHAN

(Public interventions of a desperate free-market economist)

LUIGI ZINGALES

Robert C. McCormack Professor of Entrepreneurship and Finance

Table of Contents

Preface.........................................................................................................................ii

1) "Why Paulson is Wrong".....................................................................................................1 Luigi Zingales

2) "Let's Get the Bank Rescue Right" .........................................................................................3 R. Glenn Hubbard, Hal Scott, and Luigi Zingales

3) Congressional Petition.............................................................................................................5 John Cochrane, Paola Sapienza, and Luigi Zingales

4) "Plan B" ........................................................................................................................6 Luigi Zingales

5) "Cramdown: How to Fix the Credit Mess without a Government Bailout: Quickie Bankruptcies" ..............10 Luigi Zingales

6) "A Bankruptcy to Save GM" ..............................................................................................12 Joshua Rauh and Luigi Zingales

7) "Economists Have Abandoned Principle" ...............................................................................15 Oliver Hart and Luigi Zingales

8) "Greenspan Roundtable: The Wrong Prescription;" ..................................................................17 Luigi Zingales

9) "Let's Stimulate Private Risk Taking" .....................................................................................18 Alberto Alesina and Luigi Zingales

10) "Yes, We Can, Mr Geithner"................................................................................................19 Luigi Zingales

11) "A Trust Crisis"............................................................................................................22 Paola Sapienza and Luigi Zingales

12) "From Awful to Merely Bad: Reviewing the Bank Rescue Options" .................................................30 R. Glenn Hubbard, Hal Scott, and Luigi Zingales

13) "How Big Finance Bought the Bailout Plan"..............................................................................32 Paola Sapienza and Luigi Zingales

14) "Geithner's AIG Strategy".................................................................................................34 Pietro Veronesi and Luigi Zingales

15) "Anti-Trust America"......................................................................................................36 Paola Sapienza and Luigi Zingales

16) "The Better, Cheaper Mortgage Fix".....................................................................................37 Eric Posner and Luigi Zingales

17) "We are Not All Keynesians".............................................................................................39 Luigi Zingales

18) "The New Geithner Plan is a Flop"......................................................................................41 Luigi Zingales

19) "To Regulate Finance, Try the Market".................................................................................43 Oliver Hart and Luigi Zingales

20) "A New Regulatory Framework".........................................................................................45 Luigi Zingales

21) "Stop Subsidizing the Street".............................................................................................47 Paola Sapienza and Luigi Zingales

22) "Banks Need Fewer Carrots and More Sticks"........................................................................48 R. Glenn Hubbard, Hal Scott, and Luigi Zingales

23) "Wall Street 2015".........................................................................................................50 Oliver Hart and Luigi Zingales

24) "Pay Regulation is Not the Best Way to Address Moral Hazard"....................................................52 Luigi Zingales

25) "Lehman and the Financial Crisis".......................................................................................53 John Cochrane and Luigi Zingales

26) "Capitalism After the Crisis".............................................................................................55 Luigi Zingales

27) "An Economic Agenda for the GOP"...................................................................................63 Luigi Zingales

28) "A Tax on Short-term Debt Would Stabilise the System".............................................................67 Luigi Zingales

29) "Getting the TARP Tax Wrong"..........................................................................................69 Luigi Zingales

30) "How to Make a Bank Raise Equity".....................................................................................71 Oliver Hart and Luigi Zingales

31) "The Menace of Strategic Default".......................................................................................73 Luigi Zingales

32) "Curbing Risk on Wall Street".............................................................................................76 Oliver Hart and Luigi Zingales

33) "Credit Default Swaps on Trial"..........................................................................................85 Luigi Zingales

34) "A Better Plan for Greece"................................................................................................87 Luigi Zingales

35) "Banking on the IMF".....................................................................................................88 Luigi Zingales

36) "The Bonus Risk".........................................................................................................90 Luigi Zingales

37) "The Scaremongers of the Roundtable".................................................................................92 Luigi Zingales

38) "Unpopular Financial Reform"..........................................................................................94 Paola Sapienza and Luigi Zingales

39) "How to Improve the Financial-Reform Law".........................................................................95 Oliver Hart and Luigi Zingales

P a g e | ii

Preface The last several months have been a very sad time for an economist like me who believes in capitalism and the free enterprise system. Not only have I had to witness the tragic economic consequences due to a lack of accountability at the corporate level, but I had to observe the government intervene in ways that deeply undermine the market economy, scaring away private capital. Last but not least, I had to witness economists abandon their principles and enter in a competition on who advocates the biggest waste of taxpayers' money. As a free-market economist I could not sit silent on the sideline while my temple was destroyed. I felt a moral duty to shout my reasons. Regardless of my ability to be heard and change outcomes, I could not continue doing my research without trying to defend the sound economic principles I believe in. The essays that ensue are the result of this desperate effort. Written at different times during the last several months with various audiences in mind, these essays share a common purpose: find a solution to the current crisis that preserves the fundamental incentives of the free market economy and minimize the cost for taxpayers. The principles that inspire these writings are simple. First, the market is the best mechanism we know to allocate resources. Best does not mean perfect. There are occasionally situations where a modest government intervention may improve efficiency. Before advocating this intervention, however, we economists must be clear on what the source of the market failure is that justifies this intervention and limit it to the extent of this failure. Doing otherwise will risk throwing out the baby with the bath water. And we need to make sure that the long term costs of this intervention do not outweigh the benefits. As in medicine so in economic policy the first principle should be "do no harm." There is no better subject to illustrate these principles than the real estate market. In this area the market failure is neither the falling of real estate prices nor the fact that people who cannot afford to live in their houses are forced out. Market prices adjust to direct the allocation of resources and foreclosure is a sad but necessary mechanism to address mistakes in resource allocation. The real inefficiency is that people who can afford living in their house at the current price are induced to default. They default because the way the purchase was initially financed makes it more attractive for them to leave than to stay. As the evidence suggests, houses lose between 30 and 50 percent of their value in foreclosure. Thus, unnecessary foreclosures are extremely costly. In the old days, when the mortgage was granted by your local bank, this inefficiency was eliminated through direct renegotiation. Today, securitization makes this renegotiation almost impossible. Thus, government intervention should not aim at supporting house prices, but at facilitating renegotiation in the most cost effective way. This is what the approach I propose in my "Plan B" article tries to achieve. In thinking how to help renegotiation, the intervention should be mindful of possible long term effects. A system that makes it "too easy" for the homeowners to eliminate debt might have very negative effects on future ability to borrow. For this reason, my proposal transfers part of the value of the future appreciation of the house to the lenders, to minimize their loss. I do not expect my proposed solutions to be perfect. They can certainly be improved upon. What is important is the spirit that motivates them: a desire to help improve the economic situation without destroying the market mechanisms that made this country rich.

I would like to thank Peggy Eppink and Erika Morey for their help in putting this compilation of articles together. Furthermore, I would like to thank Peggy Eppink for her invaluable editorial help in most of these articles.

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