Joseph Stiglitz
Joseph Stiglitz
Joseph Eugene Stiglitz, ForMemRS, FBA, is an American economist and a professor at Columbia University. He is a recipient of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciencesand the John Bates Clark Medal. He is a former senior vice president and chief economist of the World Bank and is a former member and chairman of theCouncil of Economic Advisers. He is known for his critical view of the management of globalization, laissez-faire economists, and some international institutions like the International Monetary...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionEconomist
Date of Birth9 February 1943
CountryUnited States of America
Wall Street banks have used the same tactic that Bush used in the war on terror - fear - and they've basically said that if you don't do what we tell you, the sky will fall. If you don't do what we tell you, it will be the end of capitalism as we know it. The failure of Lehman Brothers lent some credence to those fears.
Most people think the Iraq war has increased the probability of an attack. However, it's difficult to put this aspect into financial terms.
For instance, one of the costs of the war is that soldiers today get very seriously injured but stay alive, and we can keep them alive but at an enormous price.
World War II was really unusual, because America was in the Great Depression before. So the war did help the US economy to get securely out of this decline. This time, the war [in Iraq] is bad for the economy in both the short and long run. We could have spent trillions in research or education instead. This would have led to future productivity increases.
We are helping the people that [George W.]Bush says are evil. Teheran couldn't be happier about the high oil prices resulting from the Iraq war.
Even if Bush could be forgiven for taking America, and much of the rest of the world, to war on false pretenses, and for misrepresenting the cost of the venture, there is no excuse for how he chose to finance it. His was the first war in history paid for entirely on credit. As America went into battle, with deficits already soaring from his 2001 tax cut, Bush decided to plunge ahead with yet another round of tax relief for the wealthy.
The budgetary cost to the UK of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan through 2010 will total more than £18 billion. If we include the social costs the total impact will exceed £20 billion.
The only people benefiting in Iraq war are George Bush's Jr. friends in the oil industry. He has done the American economy and the global economy an enormous disfavor, but his Texan friends couldn't be happier.
Elderly people remember when they could go to the movie for a nickel or a quarter,
One needs to find innovative ways to transfer and absorb risks better within Asia, better ways of managing Asian financial markets.
China's growth has been export-based, but it may be difficult for it to sustain the pace of export growth.
China has been selling a lot of goods to the West, particularly to the US, but at the same time it has been providing the money to provide the goods.
You can increase the price from 25 to 40 dollars, and people can absorb it. If the price rises above 60 dollars, they become unhappy. They start to adjust, they move to smaller cars, drive a little bit less.
I told the commission that offering the two versions of Windows without a price difference was not a level playing field.