There is No Excuse for Failure on the Fiscal Cliff
Posted at 10:15 a.m. on Nov. 23, 2012
Recent evidence that the federal deficit is shrinking at record levels puts the “fiscal cliff” in a new light for Marc Chandler.
“Besides the demobilization after WWII, the other time the deficit was cut quicker was the tightening of fiscal policy in 1937 served to extend the Great Depression… The ‘cliff’ is of America’s own making. It is not being imposed by investors, as has been case for the peripheral countries in Europe. Capital is not striking against the US. But more, the fiscal cliff itself is not as much an economic problem as a sign of the dysfunctional political process. How it is avoided, mitigated or postponed, is itself a reflection of that same dysfunctional process.”
