My Q&A with Nouriel Roubini

This blog post originally appeared on RealMoney Silver on July 19 at 7:40 a.m. EDT.

-- Nouriel Roubini Yesterday afternoon, Nouriel Roubini was the speaker at the Summer Institute lecture series at the Jewish Center of the Hamptons. I attended Nouriel's talk on Sunday, having previously presented my own talk at the Temple's Summer Institute lecture series exactly a year ago in the same forum and on the same subject: the economy and the stock market. In the interests of full disclosure, I have been critical (perhaps, at times, too critical) about: the way in which the media have embraced Nouriel; in Nouriel's apparent inflexibility and dogma; and in his inaccurate stock market forecasts. In keeping with his reputation, Nouriel was escorted by a young, attractive girl, with a skirt nearly up to her pupik. (She was clearly not a congregant at the Temple!) After that entrance, things went downhill, as there was little in the way of added value (at least to this observer) extracted from his presentation, since I have heard all of it before. Nouriel gave his standard talk: The U.S. is entering either a "U" (at best) or a "W" (at worst), while over there, he estimates 0% growth in the eurozone over the next 12 months. Reduced fiscal and monetary stimuli, the cessation of temporary benefits (inventory build, Cash for Clunkers, homebuyer's tax credit, etc.) and diminished confidence (consumer and corporate) spell subpar growth (1.5% estimated second-half domestic growth). Deflationary pressures remain the mainstay in the aftermath of the last economic and credit cycle and in the face of tax policy (higher January 2011) and the obliteration of the shadow-banking system and securitization markets. In the U.S., Nouriel says we are kicking the can down the road and that we face a fiscal train wreck with no visible exit strategy in sight. The one part of his talk that stood out to me was in the section of his speech in which he talked about some possible solutions to our fiscal imbalances. Specifically, he feels that we, as a nation, have been overly preoccupied with housing-central policy. He argued that housing provides little in the way of sustained productivity and growth and that many of the benefits of home ownership (such as the mortgage-interest deduction) should be reassessed.   Loading Comments...   1 2 Last » Next › adsonar_placementId=1341527;adsonar_pid=879768;adsonar_ps=-1;adsonar_zw=600;adsonar_zh=280;adsonar_jv='ads.adsonar.com';   Loading Comments...   Recent Comments Featured Photo Galleries var galljs = document.createElement('script'); galljs.src = 'http://js.thestreet-static.com/files/tsc/v2008/js/_1279576740100/min/pages/gallery.js'; var head = document.getElementsByTagName('head')[0]; head.appendChild(galljs); Go to Slideshow Archive Business News From The Web Hypo Real Estate Said to Fail EU Stress Test BusinessWeek Online Amazon Says E-Books Now Top Hardcover Sales New York Times U.S. Allows BP to Keep Gulf Oil Well Closed for Another Day New York Times Morgan Stanley Ponders Its Property The Wall Street Journal. 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