The Case for Nationalizing the Entire Economy

by 24/7 Wall Street
Time Magazine

The advocates for nationalizing U.S. banks have been out in force recently. Senator Lindsay Graham, who almost certainly does not have a PhD in economics or finance told ABC News that banks were in such deep trouble that government ownership of the institutions may be the only way to save the financial system. Economist Nouriel Roubini, who probably has several advanced degrees, wrote in The Washington Post that the Swedes set a precedent for bank nationalization nearly 20 years ago. The first counter to his argument is that it is dark over 20 hours a day in Sweden during the winter which causes a level of depression among the population that may undermine their judgment and views of how dire any economic situation is. If this theory is true, banks in Panama will never face being taken over by the government.

Disagreeing with Roubini has not been rewarding. He predicted the current economic collapse with precision long before most economists. His forecasts for the next year or so seem reasonable and are widely viewed as a good road map for what is likely to be ahead for GDP and employment. However, he may not be right with his estimate that total banks write-offs due to toxic financial instruments sold by U.S. will be about $3.3 trillion worldwide. That is well above projections by most economists and the IMF. Nationalization of U.S. banks would cause hundreds of billions of dollars of losses to the common and preferred stockholders in the firms. This, in turn, could cause the failure of some investment funds that hold those shares. (See pictures of TIME's Wall Street covers.)

Nationalization would obviously make taxpayers responsible for the losses these banks may experience in the future. But, the taxpayer is already likely to face that fate. The federal government is in the process of guaranteeing bad paper at the banks and may end up buying many of these toxic assets to keep losses at the firms at a level where they do not have to raise even more capital.

(More here.)