Lehman Brothers: three years of denial

Lehmans crashed for a simple reason: an ignored $8tn housing bubble. But don't expect the Greenspan sycophants to admit it

Dean Baker, guardian.co.uk,
Monday 12 September 2011 14.30 BST

As we prepare to celebrate the third anniversary of the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy and the ensuing financial crisis, it's a good time to assess the situation and ask what has changed. The answer is not encouraging.

Very little has changed about either the realities on the ground or the intellectual debate on economic issues in the last three years. The "too-big-to-fail" banks are bigger than ever as a result of crisis induced mergers. Financial industry profits now exceed their pre-crisis share of corporate profits, and executive pay and bonuses are again at their bubble peaks.