Bankers’ Bailout: Quick Thoughts on the Tarp

Since the TARP has come up repeatedly in the debates between Secretary Hillary Clinton and Senator Bernie Sanders, it is worth briefly correcting a couple of major misconceptions. The first one is that we would have had a second Great Depression without the bailout. This assertion requires rejecting everything we know about the first Great Depression.

The first Great Depression was caused by a series of bank collapses as runs spread from bank to bank. The country was much better positioned t...