Today's Links

1--EU imposes wage cuts on Spanish 'Protectorate', calls for budget primacy over sovereign parliaments UK Telegraph
2--Household Debt around the world--Paul Kedrosky
3--Was the euro saved by a call from Barack Obama? UK Independent
4--Shadow Banking Meltdown-- by PIMCO's McCulley
5--Eurozone's problem children-(graphs) Big Picture
6--The case for economic gloom and doom The New Republic (Today's "must read")

Quote: "Did the housing bubble cause the recession? Yes, in the same sense that a patient suffering from lung cancer finally dies as a result of pneumonia. The bursting of the bubble precipitated the recession, but the underlying condition, which made possible the financial chicanery of the last 15 years, was the global overcapacity in tradeable goods. With American firms no longer eagerly seeking funds for expansion, the banks and shadow banks had to look elsewhere for profitable outlets. And with the economy that produces tradeable goods not producing new jobs, a government that took its responsibility for maintaining employment had to look elsewhere to stimulate demand and growth. Ergo, two bubbles, and two recessions.".....

Brenner is not saying that the U.S. economy won’t “recover” from this or future recessions. What he is saying is that we and the rest of global capitalism will continue on the gradual downward slope that began in the 1970s. We will not be able to recreate the Golden Age of capitalism that lasted from 1945 to 1970 simply by applying the right mixture of spending, subsidies, re-regulation, and international negotiation. Instead, the world economy, and the U.S. economy, will resemble the post-bubble Japan of the 1990s—with its “L-shaped” recovery writ large.......And by Brenner’s logic, there is no lasting solution to global overcapacity and falling rates of profit short of the kind of depression that shook the world in the 1930s."

7--The EU's Dangerous Game NY Times Mark Weisbrot
8--Citigroup 2006: America - A Modern Day Plutonomy
9--The Community Reinvestment Act did NOT cause the subprime Meltdown Barry Ritholtz