@techreport{NBERw15379,
 title = "Financial Crises and Economic Activity",
 author = "Stephen G. Cecchetti and Marion Kohler and Christian Upper",
 institution = "National Bureau of Economic Research",
 type = "Working Paper",
 series = "Working Paper Series",
 number = "15379",
 year = "2009",
 month = "September",
 URL = "http://www.nber.org/papers/w15379",
 abstract = {We study the output costs of 40 systemic banking crises since 1980. Most, but not all, crises in our sample coincide with a sharp contraction in output from which it took several years to recover. Our main findings are as follows. First, the current financial crisis is unlike any others in terms of a wide range of economic factors. Second, the output losses of past banking crises were higher when they were accompanied by a currency crisis or when growth was low at the onset of the crisis. When accompanied by a sovereign debt default, a systemic banking crisis was less costly. And, third, there is a tendency for systemic banking crises to have lasting negative output effects.},
}