Did Bernanke save the world?
President Obama has re-nominated Ben Bernanke to sit as Chairman of the Federal Reserve for another four-year term. Most of the media has praised Bernanke for his handling of the current economic crisis, Obama himself suggests that Bernanke helped save the US from another Great Depression. Economist Robert Pollin points out that Bernanke, as the top bank regulator in the country, played a central role in the creation of the crisis. But more importantly, according to Pollin, is that we review the Fed as a whole, and not just the individual who heads it up.
Bio
Robert Pollin is Professor of Economics at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst. He is the founding co-director of the Political Economy Research Institute (PERI). His research centers on macroeconomics, conditions for low-wage workers in the U.S. and globally, the analysis of financial markets, and the economics of building a clean-energy economy in the U.S. His books include A Measure of Fairness: The Economics of Living Wages and Minimum Wages in the US and Contours of Descent: US Economic Fractures and the Landscape of Global Austerity.
