Lessons from history

Could the current financial crisis have been predicted from historians knowledge of past down turns and depressions globally? Dr David Chambers, University Lecturer in Finance and Deputy Director of the School's Master of Finance programme, thinks so. An analysis of what happened in the crash of the 1930s may prove a good way to predict how long it may take us to get out of the current financial difficulties. Structural problems, Dr Chambers says, need to be faced up to before a recovery is likely, and there could well be a few false dawns along that road to recovery.