After the Fall

Commentary: After the Fall

A. Introduction Let me thank the organizers of this conference for the invitation to come to this beautiful place and to attend what is always an intellectually challenging conference. In fact, the challenges today are not just intellectual, but they also have enormously important practical implications. How can we restore growth, and how can we do so in a sustainable way? This paper by Carmen ...

After the fall: why fall protection isn't always enough.

Iraqi Shiites and Their Interaction with the Occupying Forces after the fall of Saddam

The logical, scientific and realistic analysis of the new developments in Iraq, due to various indicators such as the power of Shiite currents, the existence of influential leaders and the presence of foreign invaders, inevitably leads us to consider only the foreign invaders' perspective, here in this article. In fact, understanding Iraq's developments after Saddam will be a significant part o...

After the Fall: Gastrointestinal Illness following Downpours

Many older cities have “combined” sewer systems that collect both sewage and stormwater runoff in the same pipe for transport to a wastewater treatment plant. During heavy rainfalls, these combined systems can become overloaded, and water utilities must discharge the excess— what’s known as a combined sewer overflow (CSO)—into rivers and other water bodies, which may be the local source of drin...

Competition and Credit Ratings After the Fall∗

We analyze the entry of new credit rating agencies into structured finance products. Our setting is unique as we study a period in which the incumbents’ reputation was extremely poor and the benefit of more fee income from inflating ratings was low. We find entrants cater to issuers by issuing higher ratings than incumbents, particularly for interest-only (IO) tranches. Ratings by incumbents be...