They take a MASSIVE dataset - 8 centuries of data across hundreds of governments - and find the same patterns repeating. Policy makers of different stripes make the same mistakes leading to the same crises, and - when the emergency comes - they try the same failed solutions their forebears tried, often with the indignant claim that "this time it's different!"
Often, the solutions the policy makers are so apt to try just happen to be short-term band-aids, or kick-the-can-down-the-road ways to postpone the hard stuff, or ways to save face and let the next guy be caught holding the bag.
This Time is Different: Eight Centuries of Financial Folly by Carmen Reinhart and Kenneth Rogoff
http://www.reinhartandrogoff.com/
They take a MASSIVE dataset - 8 centuries of data across hundreds of governments - and find the same patterns repeating. Policy makers of different stripes make the same mistakes leading to the same crises, and - when the emergency comes - they try the same failed solutions their forebears tried, often with the indignant claim that "this time it's different!"
Often, the solutions the policy makers are so apt to try just happen to be short-term band-aids, or kick-the-can-down-the-road ways to postpone the hard stuff, or ways to save face and let the next guy be caught holding the bag.