Examines the current conditions before looking back to the events of the last century - The Great Depression, the 1970s oil crisis, the party-for-the-rich atmosphere of the 1980's and the emergence of the new economy

This paper reconsiders the role of macroeconomic shocks and policies in determining the Great Recession and the subsequent recovery in the US. The Great Recession was mainly caused by a large demand shock and by the ZLB on the interest rate policy. In contrast with previous findings, the...