Authors Chinn and Frieden: "Lost Decades"

Economics professors, Menzie D. Chinn and Jeffry A. Frieden, bring the complexity of the debt crisis into sharp focus and explains not only how the US got into such trouble, but also how we might get out in their book Lost Decades: The Making of America's Debt Crisis and the Long Recovery.

By 2008 the United States had become the biggest international borrower in world history, with almost half of its 6.4 trillion dollar federal debt in foreign hands.  The massive inflow of foreign funds financed the booms in housing prices and consumer spending that fueled the economy until the collapse of late 2008.

In the book, the authors explore the political and economic roots of this crisis as well as its long-term effects and explain the political strategies behind the Bush administration's policy of funding massive deficits with the foreign borrowing that fed the crisis. 

The event is free and open to the public.  Copies of Lost Decades will be available for sale at the event courtesy of A Cappella Books of Little Five Points.

 For more information about the library, please contact Public Affairs Director Tony Clark.