Paul Krugman recently posted on predictions of the crisis before it happened, in a piece entitled “Non-prophet Economics”. It had a set of propositions about how one should evaluate such claims with which I completely and utterly agree. I’ll quote it in its entirety, because it’s an eminently suitable starting point for evaluating whether a prediction was in fact made:
“So as I see it, we should first of all be evaluating models, not individuals; obviously we need people to interpret those entrails models, but we’re looking for the right economic framework, not the dismal Nostradamus.