Crises come and crises go, but this one seems to be in a class of its own. And now that it has arrived, it doesn't look like it's going away anytime soon.
The media started out by talking about the credit crunch. Now the headlines are all about the global recession. And with good reason. Economies throughout the world are suffering from the most pronounced setbacks they have seen in some time.
On the face of it, the situation does not seem to make much sense. There's no doubt that a global credit crunch is under way, but what we need to pay more attention to is the cause: The world of finance drifted so far away from the world of goods that it acquired a life of its own.