Neste artigo, Joseph Stiglitz engrossa o coro dos economistas renomados que vem chamando nossa atencao para, pelo menos, tres fatos irrefutaveis, relacionados a crise global: primeiro, que as causas da crise sao muito mais complexas do que as aventadas e exaustivamente repetidas pelos analistas de plantao, ao redor do mundo, circunscrevendo-as ao problema dos "subprimes" no mercado imobiliario americano e, consequentemente, ao setor financeiro (razao por que, os principais "remedios" foram direcionados a esse setor); segundo, que os fundamentos da crise sao, essencialmente, de origem macroeconomica e ja estavam estabelecidos ha bastante tempo, tanto nas economias industrializadas como nas emergentes, necessitando apenas de um gatilho para eclodirem; e terceiro, e mais importante, que a saida da crise passa necessariamente pela forte intervencao dos governos - leia-se aumento de gastos - mas, acima de tudo, que essa intervencao deve mudar radicamente de foco.Como compartilhamos dessas ideias, reproduzimos o artigo completo, para sua apreciacao. To Cure the Economy Joseph E. Stiglitz 2011-10-03To Cure the Economy NEW YORK As the economic slump that began in 2007 persists, the question on everyones minds is obvious: Why? Unless we have a better understanding of the causes of the crisis, we cant implement an effective recovery strategy. And, so far, we have neither.We were told that this was a financial crisis, so governments on both sides of the Atlantic focused on the banks. Stimulus programs were sold as being a temporary palliative, needed to bridge the gap until the financial sector recovered and private lending resumed. But, while bank profitability and bonuses have returned, lending has not recovered, despite record-low long- and short-term interest rates.The banks claim that lending remains constrained by a shortage of creditworthy borrowers, owing to the sick economy. And key data indicate that they are at least partly right. After all, large enterprises are sitting on a few trillion dollars in cash, so money is not what is holding them back from investing and hiring. Some, perhaps many, small businesses are, however, in a very different position; strapped for funds, they cant grow, and many are being forced to contract.Still, overall, business investment excluding construction has returned to 10% of GDP (from 10.6% before the crisis). With so much excess capacity in real estate, confidence will not recover to its pre-crisis level anytime soon, regardless of what is done to the banking sector.The financial sectors inexcusable recklessness, given free rein by mindless deregulation, was the obvious precipitating factor of the crisis. The legacy of excess real-estate capacity and over-leveraged households makes recovery all the more difficult.But the economy was very sick before the crisis; the housing bubble merely papered over its weaknesses. Without bubble-supported consumption, there would have been a massive shortfall in aggregate demand. Instead, the personal saving rate plunged to 1%, and the bottom 80% of Americans were spending, every year, roughly 110% of their income. Even if the financial sector were fully repaired, and even if these profligate Americans hadnt learned a lesson about the importance of saving, their consumption would be limited to 100% of their income. So anyone who