The Context of Secular Stagnation

The idea of 'secular stagnation' was first advanced by Alvin Hanson in 1938. Larry Summers revived the idea in an address to the IMF at the end of 2013. The zero lower bound on interest rates, combined with low inflation, conspire to make reaching full employment far less likely. If you think about growth in the US, it's really only been satisfactory in the presence of unsustainable speculative bubbles.