Tim Harford, why should the 2008 bank crisis have reminded even an "undercover" economist of that “banking matters”?

Sir, Tim Harford writes: “If 2008 was a sharp reminder that banking matters, then 2016 has reminded us that politics matters too” “Prediction in an age of uncertainty” October 29.

Obviously this has to be a statement made by a deskbound undercover economist, or by one of his current bank regulation technocrats colleagues, and not by a main-street economist. If there is little as important to an economy’s real day-today, always, that is the access to bank credit, especially in a Europe so dominated by banks.

Here Harford also writes about predictions in age on uncertainty, without seemingly having understood that the Basel Committee’s capital requirements for banks were predicated on believing in a 100% world of certainty.

Harford refers to Nicholas Bloom concluding in that “uncertainty also causes recessions because it makes consumers, employers and investors hesitate before spending money. And if we all hesitate, that is exactly what a recession looks like.”

Sir, but what is more hesitation than that what bank regulators showed, when they decided banks should not be able to leverage as much with what they perceived as risky than with what they perceived as safe… as if banks had ever done such thing.

@PerKurowski ©