Overrated and Over Here

“The Fact that our economical models at The Fed, the best in the world, have been wrong for fourteen straight quarters, does not mean they will not be right in the fifteenth quarter.”

It was with a certain amount of dismay that I learned of the news that former US Central Bank chief Alan Greenspan is coming over to advise the Treasury on economic policy following his retirement in the US. This is a man who has spent his career making mildly cryptic announcements on economics which in effect state the bloody obvious and convey almost no wisdom at all but because of his exalted position these banal pronouncements are held in such high regard. Mind you judging by Gordon Brown’s performance the obvious is just the tonic that he most sorely needs. Greenspan has previously referred to Brown as “without peer amongst the world’s economic policymakers” and Brown of Greenspan “the world’s greatest economic leader of our generation” so I suspect these two overrated civil servants are going to get along just fine. The only good news is that he is offering his services to UK plc for free, so at least we are getting value for money.