{"id":4414,"date":"2012-05-08T11:14:10","date_gmt":"2012-05-08T15:14:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/timscogitorium.com\/tinblog\/?p=4414"},"modified":"2012-05-08T11:14:13","modified_gmt":"2012-05-08T15:14:13","slug":"the-dangers-of-american-exceptionalism","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/timscogitorium.com\/tinblog\/2012\/05\/the-dangers-of-american-exceptionalism.html","title":{"rendered":"The Dangers of American Exceptionalism"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"American<\/a>Sean Hannity often says that America is the greatest best country God has ever given man on the face of this Earth.\u00a0 It’s an oft repeated mantra, which if taken in the spirit of national pride and unity would be just fine.\u00a0 However, it is more often interpreted as some sort of birthright that America should rule the world… militarily, economically, intellectually, spiritually, and well hey… did I mention that we’re number one?<\/p>\n

The trouble, of course, is that when you view everyone else as subordinate, you tend to believe they have nothing to teach you.\u00a0 I’ve written before<\/a> about how there are countries out there with proven successes in achieving exactly the goals we’re trying to achieve in healthcare and education, but we are not even seriously studying or talking about these foreign models.<\/p>\n

Now comes evidence that Iceland<\/a> has done wonders in solving their housing market issues as well as getting their financial system back in order following the 2008 meltdown of both.\u00a0 In a nutshell, Iceland took over its banking industry rather than just bailing it out as we did here in the US.\u00a0 It then forgave any mortgage debt above 110% of a home’s value for all its citizens.\u00a0\u00a0 This dramatically reduced the debt burden for most households and kept consumer spending from plummeting. It then instituted extensive new regulations on the banking industry to prevent another 2008-style catastrophe.\u00a0 Further, it has actively pursued criminal charges against almost 300 banking executives who were directly responsible for decisions leading up to the crash.\u00a0 The result?<\/p>\n

Iceland’s $13 billion annual economy declined 6.7 percent the following year, in 2009, but has since rebounded and will expand by 2.4 percent this year and in 2013, the OECD estimated. Meanwhile, in the rest of debt-ridden Europe, the economy will collectively expand by a paltry 0.2 percent this year and only 1.6 percent the next, OECD estimates said in November.<\/em><\/p>\n

Housing is now just about 3 percent below values in September 2008, just before the financial collapse. So improved is the nation’s economic and fiscal outlook that Fitch Ratings in February raised the country to investment grade with a stable outlook, stating the country’s “unorthodox crisis policy response has succeeded.”<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

By comparison, the US is projected to grow at 2.2% in 2012, the housing market remains underwater, and the banks are returning to many of the same policies that led to the crash in the first place.<\/p>\n

It’s not clear that what happened in Iceland is directly applicable to the US.\u00a0 Perhaps those programs and policies would not function here as well for one reason or another.\u00a0 But the crime is that we are not even talking about it\u2014not even trying to learn from their experience.\u00a0 The mainstream press has given Iceland almost no coverage.\u00a0 Politicians are not discussing what happened there and debating its applicability to our economy.\u00a0 As far as the US is concerned, Iceland doesn’t exist.<\/p>\n

Is this because we’re too proud to admit a bunch of foreigners have something to teach us?\u00a0 Or is it because the special interests have a stranglehold on the media and the politicians and are suppressing stories that would lead to policies unfavorable to their moneyed interests?\u00a0 It’s not clear.\u00a0 But what is clear is that other countries are solving problems that we need to solve, and we’re idiots if we can’t find something to learn from them.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Iceland has solved its housing and financial crises. Over and over, other countries are solving problems that we need to solve, and we’re idiots if we can’t find something to learn from them.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[120,21,43,40],"class_list":["post-4414","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","tag-american-exceptionalism","tag-conservatives","tag-economic-policy","tag-gop"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/timscogitorium.com\/tinblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4414","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/timscogitorium.com\/tinblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/timscogitorium.com\/tinblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timscogitorium.com\/tinblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timscogitorium.com\/tinblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4414"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/timscogitorium.com\/tinblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4414\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4420,"href":"https:\/\/timscogitorium.com\/tinblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4414\/revisions\/4420"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/timscogitorium.com\/tinblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4414"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timscogitorium.com\/tinblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4414"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timscogitorium.com\/tinblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4414"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}