Below are the media links and the links to the two Thursday sessions at Town Hall.
Media:
KVI with John Carlson, May 22
KIRO with Dave Ross May 22
KEXP with Mike McCormick, May 25
Audio[A follow-up interview with John Carlson and a session with Ross Reynolds of KUOW were cancelled due to the breaking news of the I-5 bridge collapse.]
Video
ARCHIVE OF
MAY 23 AT TOWN HALL
"Money, Monetary Policy and Financial Repression," with Gerard Fitzpatrick of Russell Investments:
AUDIO of evening session via Demand Side Economics podcast
A piece by Charles Mudede "Oppression by Boredom" in the Stranger
This is the story Alan Harvey mentioned in the introduction:
Steve's lost bet and trek to the top of the mountain yields swags for the homeless.
Here is the story promised in our introductions to Steve at Seattle's Town Hall May 23.
Being interviewed on Australian national television about his debt analysis, Steve was asked a side question about the Australian housing market. He replied that house prices had dropped in Japan by 40 percent in real terms in the ten to fifteen years following the peak of their housing bubble, and Australia should not expect to be different.
The housing bulls went for him.
In a talk later at the library at Parliament House (Australia's national legislature), he was challenged by his co-presenter, banker and interest rate strategist Rory Robertson. Halfway through Steve's talk, Robertson said (incorrectly) "You are most famous for your housing price call. You said house prices are going to fall by 40 percent peak to trough. If they fall by less, you have to walk to Mt. Kosciusko (KOZ-ee-OSS-ko). If they fall by less, I will walk."
(Full disclosure, Steve was appearing at Parliament House not for his fame in making housing calls.)
The month before the bet the government instituted the "First Time Vendor's Boost," which multiplied the subsidy for first-time home buyers by two to three times. When house prices rose, Robertson declared that Steve had lost the bet.
In fact, he had never said that house prices would fall from the point of his statement, only that they would (or could) fall by 40 percent over a ten- to fifteen-year period. But rather than litigate in the media, Steve chose to walk. Starting from Canberra, Steve and thirteen supporters walked the 240 kilometers (160 miles) in nine days to the top of the 7,300-foot mountain in nine days. They were joined for at least part of the trek by between 60 and 100 others (Steve is not sure the exact number).
Turning the experience into a kind of walk-a-thon, they raised $15,000 for "Swags for the Homeless." A "swag" is a one-person tent or bivouac. See here. They purchased and distributed 250 of the swags and turned the lost bet into a win for the homeless and a national media event.
