This paper studies the role of leverage in the business cycle. Based on a study of nearly 200 recession episodes in 14 advanced countries between 1870 and 2008, we document a new stylized fact of the modern business cycle: more credit-intensive booms tend to be followed by deeper recessions and...

Speech to UCLA Symposium at UC Berkeley, Berkeley, California, October 30, 2008

Presentation to the Commonwealth Club of California, San Francisco CA, June 30, 2009

To understand Fed policy at this point, you have to look at this whole picture. We have good GDP growth, but a yawning shortfall of employment and output from potential levels. ; Presentation to the Chicago Booth Graduate School of Business Alumni Club of San Francisco, San Francisco, Ca,...

Speech to the Silicon Valley Chapter of Financial Executives International, Palo Alto, California, October 14, 2008.

Speech to the Asia Society of Southern California, Los Angeles, California, February 6, 2007

Two separate narratives have emerged in the wake of the Global Financial Crisis. One speaks of private financial excess and the key role of the banking system in leveraging and deleveraging the economy. The other emphasizes the public sector balance sheet over the private and worries about the...

This paper models the causes of the 2008 financial crisis together with its manifestations, using a Multiple Indicator Multiple Cause (MIMIC) model. Our analysis is conducted on a cross-section of 107 countries; we focus on national causes and consequences of the crisis, ignoring crosscountry...

Are countries with unregulated capital flows more vulnerable to currency crises? Efforts to answer this question properly must control for "self selection" bias since countries with liberalized capital accounts may also have more sound economic policies and institutions that make them less...

This paper introduces a model of international lender of last resort (ILLR) activity under asymmetric information. The ILLR is unable to distinguish between runs due to debtor insolvency and those which are the result of pure sunspots. Nevertheless, the ILLR can elicit the underlying state of...