After the Global Financial Crisis, policymakers worried about the consequences of budget deficits and rising public debt. Many feared runaway inflation. Fiscal consolidation resulted, which may or may not have hurt the recovery. There was, however, no inflation. Learning fromt that mistake, stimuli flowed more freely this time. But now we have inflation, which may or may not reflect policy mistakes.
This phenomonenon of avoiding the past mistake and making new ones isn’t, of course, limited to econocrats. Generals are, after all, famous for fighting the last war.
Well, one way to avoid any mistake is to do nothing. If you don’t aim and shoot, then you can’t miss, right?
You could do that. Or you could make sure to avoid the past mistakes, try new stuff, and make whole new mistakes to learn from.
Here is to making original mistakes in 2022.