I was watching the BBC’s live round table discussion with very prominent economists as to what to do about the global, financial, economic crisis, in the USA and in Europe. They are concerned about unemployment, declining economic growth, recession and the potential for country defaults.
People around the table included the managing director of the IMF, the CEO of Pimco and a distinguished professor of economics from Chicago.
What they are saying in summary is – there is a crisis of unemployment, the financial markets are sick and there is declining economic growth. The result is a serious crisis, potential for a double dip recession and potential for a default by some countries.
They recommend different solutions about how to solve this financial crisis.
The common denominator to their solutions is that they are trying to get back to what we had before, which is full employment, healthy financial markets and economic growth.
Out with the Old and In with the New
Looking at what has gone before is always going to be useful because there are lessons that we can learn that helps us to find present and future solutions. But…
“Telling the future by looking at the past assumes that conditions remain constant. This is like driving a car by looking in the rear view mirror.” anonymous
Obviously conditions do not remain constant so, why is thereare these eminent men (and it was only men) spending so much time debating and analysing how we can return to how things used to be?
Can we have continuously growing markets as a future goal? Is it sustainable? Isn’t there a point where there are limits to growth?
Surely we need something new – a paradigm shift in our thinking?
The solution to our present problems is not the goal of going back to our past but creating a new future.
“Losers live in the past. Winners learn from the past and enjoy working in the present toward the future.” Denis Waitley