Wall Street Journal
January 2, 2012
This, of course, is supposed to be the time of year for thinking positively, for looking ahead and making plans. At the start of 2012, that seems particularly hard.
Wherever one looks in the world, the challenges seem immense, but nowhere more so than in Europe. The financial crisis that started in the summer of 2007 continues like a glacier to reshape the economic, political and social landscape, crushing old certainties beneath its remorseless logic. Policy makers appear hopelessly unequal to the forces ranged against them, unable to reconcile themselves to the new reality of low growth, low returns and global deleveraging that requires the kind of tough decisions that most have been ducking for decades.
No wonder investors ended 2011 in a state of acute anxiety, abandoning entire markets and choosing instead to crowd into a shrinking pool of supposedly safe assets. It isn't hard to rattle off a list of things that could go wrong in the next 12 months, deepening the financial crisis and making it harder for individuals and families to preserve their savings and maintain their living standards. But while history shows that sometimes the worst-case scenario plays out, usually it doesn't. So what needs to go right in 2012 to ensure the year ends more optimistically than it began?
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