On Sat, 6 Jan 2001, Doug Henwood wrote:
> According to my late friend John Liscio, a JP Morgan economist told
> him that Greenspan was seriously worried about the risks of deflation
> starting around 1996, and rejected calls from Wall Street and within
> the Fed to tighten. Morgan used to be known as the "second Fed," so
> close it was to the real thing, and Greenspan himself served on the
> Morgan board before ascending to the Fed chair, so this would have to
> be considered a leak with an excellent pedigree.
Interesting. So if we extrapolate from this, whether there was a surplus or deficit never entered into Greespan's thinking when he made this crucial decision to loosen? So the association of looser policy and surpluses is completely accidental?
Michael
__________________________________________________________________________ Michael Pollak................New York City..............mpollak at panix.com