Could the Crisis in Europe Drag Down the U.S.?

"If something goes wrong in Europe, it's delusional to think there won't be a ripple effect in the United States," says Adolfo Laurenti, deputy chief economist at Mesirow Financial. "We would be heavily exposed one way or another—it may be through some of our banks, through the Federal Reserve, which is providing a lot of short-term money through the swap lines, or it might just be that Europe is a major trading partner."

But there is a silver lining: Although the situation in Europe might look like a repeat of 2008, everyone's seen that tragedy before, and no one wants an encore. "Policymakers are desperately trying to be sure this has a different ending this time," Warne says. "Everyone wants to avoid what happened in 2008."

mhandley@usnews.com

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