> michael perelman wrote:
>
> At some point, people realize that this paper is nothing more than a blank
>> sheet of writing paper. The bubble may have stimulated some investment that
>> is capable of producing real economic benefits, but mostly it has induced
>> people to consume and commit themselves to pay back debts.
>>
>
> The passage above suggests that the problem is that people eventually
> realize the paper is worthless. What if everyone continued to agree that
> the paper was worth something? Would that really solve the economic
> problem?
>
> I think it's more helpful to conceptualize the psychological factors
> (investor confidence, etc.) as the precipitate of material economic
> conditions, not vice versa.
>
> Miles
>
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>
Interesting dilemma... but what if people are trying to apply an entirely inadequate framework to the problem? Is it material conditions generating economic chaos; or is it psychological factors causing the downturn? But here's a question: what if its absolute ideational and economic confusion? What if we weren't to attribute the "cause" to either psychological OR material factors and were to put it down to pure... as Sartre called it... "nausea"?
I recall watching a recent interview with Stiglitz, Klein, Harvey and de Soto. De Soto put forward the idea that we had based our entire social structure on private property relations and had failed to maintain these rights solidly... perhaps he has got a more interesting point than people want to recognise...