- Financial Instability and Economic Crises

Catalog description

Throughout the history of market economies, financial markets have periodically experienced rapid changes in the prices of financial assets, i.e., booms and crashes. These periods of instability are often connected to rising unemployment, fall in production, and painful economic crises. In spite of this, an influential contingent of economists - sometimes referred to as "free market" economists - continue to argue that all markets are stable and that government regulations are at best unnecessary and at worst counterproductive. This course studies the historical development of the "free market" ideology and explores many of the serious challenges to this ideology that come from both economic theory and economic history.