The Blame Game, Financial Meltdown Edition

By Michelle Studer, on June 18, 2009

There’s a lot to be said for personal responsibility, but now and again a round of the Blame Game is well-deserved and even necessary. In fact, a series of Time Magazine articles from earlier this year, that includes: In Defense of the Recession Blame Game, The Financial Crisis Blame Game, and 25 People to Blame for the Financial Crisis did just that.

Pulling no punches and taking no prisoners, the articles point fingers at everyone from American consumers to Bill Clinton for causing last year’s economic meltdown. The reason these pieces of writing should matter to you is because they offer a great overview of the myriad decisions and multiple players that fueled the financial mess we’re now in.

Although it’s hard to pinpoint every mitigating factor, the Time articles highlight a number of often-overlooked elements that paved the way for today’s economic fiasco, such as the creation of the adjustable rate mortgage (ARM) back in the early 1980s and the willingness of Standard & Poor’s –- along with other rating agencies –- to hand out unmerited AAA seals of approval, which lulled investors into feeling a sense of safety that didn’t really exist for certain types of investments.

The article series also points out more well-known causes for the current financial funk. Among other things, this included a 40-year pattern spun by American consumers of saving less and spending more that eventually led to an average household debt that was more than 130% of income by 2007. Another major factor that is now known to many was the short-sightedness, arrogance and greed displayed by a number of high-level executives at Lehman Brothers, AIG, Countrywide and other financial institutions.

To put it in a nutshell, even if you think you have a good understanding of the economic crisis, the  series published by Time takes an in-depth look at more pieces of the puzzle and provides a better sense of just how avoidable most of the fallout really was. A century ago, philosopher George Santayana famously warned that “those who fail to learn from history are destined to repeat it.” The present financial mess gives us evidence that he’s right, and a solid understanding of its underlying causes is essential in order to avoid similar disaster in the future.

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Michelle Studer helps write for the BudgetPulse blog. BudgetPulse is a free, interactive, web-based personal budgeting software. BudgetPulse was developed it with one objective in mind: a simple application to track finances and payment obligations. Because it is web-based, users are able to access BudgetPulse anywhere and anytime.

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