Economics & Finance

A Crash Course on Crises: Macroeconomic Concepts for Run-Ups, Collapses, and Recoveries

An incisive overview of the macroeconomics of financial crises—essential reading for students and policy experts alike

Paperback

Price:
$24.95/£20.00
ISBN:
Published:
May 20, 2025
Pages:
136
Size:
6.13 x 9.25 in.
Illus:
32 b/w illus.
Main_subject:
Economics & Finance
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With alarming frequency, modern economies go through macro-financial crashes that arise from the financial sector and spread to the broader economy, inflicting deep and prolonged recessions. A Crash Course on Crises brings together the latest cutting-edge economic research to identify the seeds of these crashes, reveal their triggers and consequences, and explain what policymakers can do about them.

Each of the book’s ten self-contained chapters introduces readers to a key economic force and provides case studies that illustrate how that force was dominant. Markus Brunnermeier and Ricardo Reis show how the run-up phase of a crisis often occurs in ways that are preventable but that may go unnoticed and discuss how debt contracts, banks, and a search for safety can act as triggers and amplifiers that drive the economy to crash. Brunnermeier and Reis then explain how monetary, fiscal, and exchange-rate policies can respond to crises and prevent them from becoming persistent.

With case studies ranging from Chile in the 1970s to the COVID-19 pandemic, A Crash Course on Crises synthesizes a vast literature into ten simple, accessible ideas and illuminates these concepts using novel diagrams and a clear analytical framework.


Awards and Recognition

  • A Financial Times Best Book of the Year: Economics