The Great Recession
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Austrian Economics - The school of economics developed by Ludwig von Mises.  http://mises.org/

Boom/Bust Cycle - According to the Austrian School of economics, excessive lending causes an artificial boom in economic activity which is followed by a bust that cleans out malinvestment.

Debasing A Currency - Reducing a currencies' value versus other currencies.  Accomplished through expansion of credit or printing money.

Deflation - Decrease in the money supply and subsequent price decreases.

Depression - 10% top to bottom drop in GDP.

Dollar Index - A weighting of the US dollar vs. a basket of the following six currencies: Euro, Japanese Yen, Pound Sterling, Canadian dollar, Swedish krona, Swiss franc.  Dollar Index Graph.

Fiat Money - Money created by decree.  Fiat money essentially has no backing - i.e. not officially convertible at a fixed rate to something else - gold, silver, etc.

Fractional Reserve Banking - The ability of a banking institution to keep a fraction of money deposited on hand while lending out the rest.

GDP (Gross Domestic Product)  = private consumption + gross investment + government spending + (exports − imports)

Great Depression - 25% top to bottom drop in GDP.

Gresham's Law - An artificially undervalued money will drive an overvalued money out of circulation.  i.e. - the pre-1965 90% silver / 10% copper quarters no longer circulate while people actively use the current nickel clad copper quarters.

Inflation - The classical definition was expansion of the money supply with price increases following.  19th century definition included the expansion of credit.

Monetization - When used in the context of a country, typically means the central bank prints money to purchase government debt.

Money Multiplier Effect - The result of fractional reserve banking.  Assuming a 20% reserve policy, $100 lent to a bank can turn in to $80 lent again, which can turn into another $64 lent once more and so on.

Keynesian Economics - The school of economics developed by John Maynard Keynes.

Recession -  The National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) has not produced an official standard, but the unofficial standard is two or more quarters of negative GDP growth.