The dominance of the US model of market capitalism seemed, by the end of the 1990s, to be unassailable. The role of the financial sector in all this, moreover, was pivotal. US equity and debt markets channeled vast quantities of capital into the corporate sector, and especially the high-tech sector, at quite low cost.
2  Ben Bernanke, while a Governor of the US Federal Reserve Board, gave the best explanation along these lines. He originally called it the “glut of savings” argument, but it could more appropriately be called the “dearth of investment” argument because there has not really been an increase in world savings, only a redistribution.