A lot of the talk here at Davos is, unsurprisingly, about financial regulation. At TIME’s Board of Economists yesterday morning, David Rubenstein of the Carlyle Group had a nice take on why we probably shouldn’t hold our breath for a bunch of nations getting together to pass the same laws in order to prevent regulatory arbitrage:
“At the World Economic Forum,” said Rubenstein, “you should always say, yes, multilateralism is possible and we should come together. But getting national solutions is difficult enough.”
Pessimistic or realistic? You decide. Yale economist Bob Shiller—like most people here—is holding out hope. I cornered him in the hall for a few questions which you can see video of at this link. UPDATE: Or you can just watch it here.
(Thanks to Michael Arrington of TechCrunch and Jeremy Allaire of Brightcove for the technical help. UPDATE: Thanks also to Craig and Daniel back in New York—I tend to need a lot of technical help.)