in the aftermath of a bursting asset “bubble.” They are led to explore the implications of their hypothesis on the basis of evidence that suggests that despite the ongoing difficulties in the Japanese banking sector, desired capital expenditure was for the most part fully financed. They suggest that Japan's sluggish investment activity is likely to be better understood in terms of low levels of desired capital expenditure and not in terms of credit constraints that prohibit firms from financing projects with positive net present value (NPV). Monetary or fiscal policies might increase consumption in the short run, but unless productivity growth increases, there is a legitimate fear that such a policy may simply transform Japan from a low-growth/low-inflation economy to a low-growth/high-inflation economy. In her analysis of Japan's gradual path to economic success and then quick reversal, Jennifer Amyx wrote that Japanese experts were not unaware of the possible causes of Japan's economic decline. Rather, to return Japan's economy back to the path to economic prosperity, policymakers would have had to adopt policies that would first cause short-term harm to the Japanese people and government. Under this analysis, says Ian Lustick, Japan was stuck on a "local maximum," which it arrived at through gradual increases in its fitness level, set by the economic landscape of the 1970s and 80s. Without an accompanying change in institutional flexibility, Japan was unable to adapt to changing conditions and even though experts may have known which changes needed to be made, they would have been virtually powerless to enact those changes without instituting unpopular policies which would have been harmful in the short-term. Lustick's analysis is rooted in the application of evolutionary theory and natural selection to understanding institutional rigidity in the social sciences. Legacy After the Great Recession of 2007–2009, many Western governments and commentators have referenced the Lost Decades as a distinct economic possibility for stagnating developed nations. On February 9, 2009, in warning of the dire consequences facing the US economy after its housing bubble, U.S. President Barack Obama cited the "lost decades" as a prospect the American economy faced. And in 2010, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis President James Bullard warned that the United States was in danger of becoming "enmeshed in a Japanese-style deflationary outcome within the next several years." See also Economic history of Japan Economic stagnation Princes of the Yen: book by Richard Werner about the