President Obama's top economic adviser said today that the economy would benefit from a little more greed, just not too much.
"In the past few years, we've seen too much greed and too little fear; too much spending and not enough saving; too much borrowing and not enough worrying. Today, however, our problem is exactly the opposite," National Economic Council Director Lawrence Summers said in a speech at the Brookings Institution, a Washington, D.C. think tank.
He said that in laying the groundwork for the next economic expansion, policymakers should aim to have conditions that are "fundamentally sound and not driven by financial excess."
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Summers, who served as secretary of the treasury under President Clinton, said one of the goals of the current administration's policies of injecting more capital into the banking system is to "create virtuous circles in which stronger markets beget stronger financial institutions, which beget stronger markets, leading ultimately to financial and economic recovery."
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