The Financial Crisis

Abstract

This chapter discusses the origins of the 2007 financial crisis, subprime lending, and government-sponsored entities. It argues that the events driving financial markets to the precipice of collapse during the global financial meltdown gave rise to a regulatory framework that may have been a rational response to a market in free fall, but need to be reassessed in an era of recovery. In 2018, the U.S. economy may be, by many measures, viewed as wholly recovered from the economic impact of the crisis. The stock market is trading at record highs, having erased all the losses of the crisis period and then some. With this recovery, the Trump administration seeks to restrain the regulatory burden imposed during the crisis.