Five years into the crisis, growth in the U.S. is still below potential, Europe is struggling to pull out of recession and major emerging economies are slowing rapidly after an initial resilience during 2010-2011.
It took world leaders some time to realise that the financial crisis initiated by the collapse of the subprime mortgage segment of U.S. financial markets in 2007 would not exhaust its effects in an ordinary recession.
For a long time it was a given that while Europe was based on defending a more just society, with social values and solidarity, the United States was based on the glory of individualism and competition, and anything public was considered “socialist”.