Sophia Kuehnlenz

Recent Economic Bubbles and Possible Implications for Economic Policy Sophia Kuehnlenz

Master's Thesis from the year 2013 in the subject Business economics - Economic Policy, grade: 1,3, University of Bamberg, course: Volkswirtschaftslehre Dynamische Wirtschaftspolitik, language: English, comment: I would like to thank Prof. Dr. for his inspirational guidance and reassuring support not only while working on this paper. He encouraged me to stay true to my beliefs especially concerning financial markets, even if at times it seemed to be against all odds. To my family and friends, who always believed in me. Thank you for calming my nerves whenever needed. , abstract: Repeatedly bubbles occur during times of "extended investments in infrastructure such as canals or railroads"(Charles P. Kindleberger, "Manias, Panics and Crashes", p. 10) or around technological inventions that are made available for the general public such as cars, electricity, phone - lines and the internet. They go hand in hand with financial inventions, financial liberalization and excess leverage. Examples are, among many others, the Japanese Asset Price bubble of the late 1980ies and early 1990ies, the Dot-Com bubble 1997-2000, as well as the recent Financial Crisis 2007-2008. Frequently these bubbles are fueled by the overoptimistic outlook not only of the so-called experts or gurus but also by the extremely positive perception of the general public resulting in a "this - time - is - different - feeling", "new - era - talks" or the "it -won't happen - to - us - believe"(See for example Shiller, Kindleberger, Reinhart and Rogoff, Galbraith). Most of the time these bubbles are self - feeding processes. Business expansion leads to economic growth and greater income. Public spending increases which leads to the need of expanding production. Credit is needed for investment and during times of a boom it is easily made available. Often new financial instruments come into play as well as the deregulation of financial markets to meet the demand for credit. Businesses can expand further whic