Interestingly, both Paul Saffo and Mark Thoma are pushing for more and better information faster as a (the?) way to prevent future financial blow-ups. Thoma is focusing on the Federal Reserve, Soffa on the economy as a whole. Both feel that we should join the information age, failure to do so is virtually criminal.
Thoma does go beyond the need for better information faster. He feels that the Fed has been worried much more about inflation, rather than jobs. Who can argue against this conclusion when the Fed minutes corroborate Thoma's thesis?
Soffa feels that we need a new Bretton Woods, but doesn't think we'll act on this until we get hammered again. In the meantime we need an economic clearinghouse "with the analytic resources of Wall Street players, the reach of Google, and the openness of Wikipedia. Such an observatory would leverage the capacities of cyberspace to become a global (and cost-effective) clearinghouse for economic information. .... it would serve a purely informational role with no policy responsibilities."
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