His governments carried out a policy of economic nationalism that included public works, the creation of numerous state regulatory agencies, the nationalization of foreign petroleum interests, and the establishment of a state-owned petroleum company.
February 20 , 1819Zürich, Switzerland December 6, 1882 Zürich, Switzerland Alfred Escher, (born Feb. 20, 1819, Zürich died Dec. 6, 1882, Zürich) dominant figure in 19th-century Zürich politics and legislator of national prominence who, as a railway magnate, became a leading opponent of railway nationalization.
Next, he pointed out that full nationalization of a financial institution might trigger systemic shocks, as investors retreated from other banks, creating exactly the kind of panic that nationalization was intended to prevent.
Summers pointed to the example of Sweden, which was regularly cited by economists who favored nationalization.
Simple really.Mr Salmon adds:Put like that, it's clear why the plan is a bad idea: it gives banks' executives every incentive to take massive risks to avoid nationalization.
Summers concluded by emphasizing that nationalization was a strategy that governments turn to only after it is very clear that nothing else can work.Some of these reasons are better than others, but in general they're fairly compelling; certainly, I was of the opinion that nationalisation was not worth the risk.
And while Chávez has done a good job of redistributing oil revenue to the Venezuelan poor, via so-called misiones, designed to improve education, health care, and housing, and has forced oil companies to renegotiate contracts, there has been no nationalization of industry, relatively little interference with markets, and only small gestures toward land reform.
Thus, he's unveiled a confusing "non-nationalization" plan that he does think he can put into place and that will, at the end of the day, permit bank nationalization as an option.Now, there is a real risk to being deliberately misleading on banking policy in the current environment.
If you put that together with Obama's remarks on Sweden and the fact that the plan Geithner announced yesterday does in fact leave open nationalization as a possibility, then I think we need to at least consider the possibility that Obama believes the banks will need to be nationalized but doesn't believe it's politically feasible to say this or get congress to agree to it.
And temporary nationalization is still, apparently, considered unthinkable.But this refusal to face the facts means, in practice, an absence of action.
And nationalization, well, it's not happening in America... What the Obama administration pulled off in Detroit was a bailout, not a takeover.
