Phil Angelides looks back at the economic collapse of 2008; Economic Roundtable: How is California faring five years after Lehman?; Should parents be concerned about proposed changes to 'Common Core' testing?; Exhibit explores Father Junipero Serra's life, 300 years later, plus much more.
Phil Angelides looks back at the economic collapse of 2008
It's been five years since the bankruptcy and collapse of the Lehman Brothers investment bank. The company's collapse set a major financial crisis into motion.
RELATED: Financial crash 5 years later: A timeline of key events in the Great Recession
Phil Angelides headed the government's Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, was the man charged with investigating the cause of that ensuing financial crisis. He joins the show to talk about how we got to where we are today.
RELATED: Great Recession Redux: Where are they now?
Interview Highlights:
On where he was during the Lehman collapse:
"In 2008 I was in Los Angeles having served for eight years as treasurer. I was now back in the private sector and I was like millions of other Americans watching as our financial system unravelled. It was almost unbelievable, but it was the inevitable consequence of decades of deregulation, decades of enormous power applied on policy by the big banks in this country. That day was years in the making."
RELATED: Financial crash 5 years later: Where are YOU now? (poll)
On the decision by the government not to rescue Lehman Bros:
"The system was rotted by that time. Whether or not there had been a rescue of Lehman, the fact is the financial system was becoming unhinged because of the recklessness in which the banks had engaged for years. Whether or not Lehman was bailed out, our financial system was headed for a crash."
RELATED: Looking back: How did Lehman Brothers' bankruptcy affect you?
On whether the financial crash was inevitable:
"We found that this was an avoidable crisis. If you looked at what had transpired in the years up to 2008, it was not a matter of risk models gone bad it was not a matter of the perfect storm as some on Wall Street would want us to believe, but the result of very conscious policy decisions.
On the findings of the FCIC report:
"The Federal Reserve had ample evidence of the egregious, abusive, pervasive predatory lending practices that were going on throughout this country in the late 1990s and beyond...We found that the Securities and Exchange Commission knew that the big investment banks like Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers and Merrill Lynch were highly leveraged and in a highly risky position, but they didn't constrain their activities. Of course we also found that in the course of the lead up to the crisis, there were many breaches of ethics and accountability, wrongdoing by institutions and individuals that tipped the system over. "
On what surprised him during his research:
"Starting in the '90s with less regulation, less supervision, banks began, frankly, to be less bankers and more casino operators. I was stunned when I took over as chairman of this commission, at the extent to which our major financial institutions were engaged not in the practice of lending top grow our economy, but rathe for speculation for their own gain, and it turned out to be extraordinarily dangerous for the country given the concentration of powers in so few financial institutions."
On how deregulation influenced the severity of the crisis:
"Over the decade since the 1980s, the deregulatory ethos reigned supreme in Washington. There was this mindset that what we needed was less regulation, let the banks do their own thing, they're smart guys, they know what to do. That turned out to be a disastrous policy. Why did that happen? Enormous power by the financial institutions who at every turn lobbied Congress, lobbied the regulatory agencies, put pressure through their thousands of lobbyists and hundreds of millions of dollars of campaign contributions to lighten the hand of public protection. I think that was a seminal reason for the ultimate collapse."
Economic Roundtable: How is California faring five years after Lehman?
When financial giant Lehman Brothers collapsed five years ago, the shake-up on Wall Street rattled homes out here, too. As we recover, a new UCLA Anderson Report tells the story of two Californias.
RELATED: Great Recession Redux: Where are they now?
One where the tech sector and other high-skilled jobs are driving growth, and another where people in manufacturing, construction, and other low-tech fields are still struggling to see that recovery.
RELATED: Financial crash 5 years later: Where are YOU now? (poll)
To dig deeper into how else California's economy changed we invited three economic and financial experts to help us understand how our state is doing.
Guests:
Raphael Bostic, professor of public policy at USC and a former assistant secretary at the US Department of Housing and Urban Development
Delia Fernandez, a certified financial planner and president of Fernandez Financial Advisory in Los Alamitos
Jordan Levine, director of economic research with Beacon Economics
Ask Emily On Take Two: The basics of Obamacare
Now it's time for our regular explainer "Ask Emily," about the Affordable Care Act, better known as Obamacare. Chances are, many of you may have questions about how exactly the new law will affect you.
Joining the show is Emily Bazar, senior writer for the California Healthcare Foundation Center for Health Reporting.
Today she explains the basics of Obamacare: when it starts, how you enroll, etc. She also explains how dental and vision coverage works under the new plan.
Should parents be concerned about proposed changes to 'Common Core' testing?
The California state legislature passed a bill this week that ushers in new standardized tests for public school students. It's based on the new "Common Core" standards, and it reduces the number of tests students will take this spring.
RELATED: LA Unified's plan to implement Common Core standards put on hold
The idea of taking fewer tests will probably sound pretty awesome to kids out there. But parents? They could have a reason to be a little worried.
KPCC's education reporter Annie Gilbertson joins us to explain.
Exhibit explores Father Junipero Serra's life, 300 years later
If you grew up in California, you probably know something about Father Junipero Serra, the creator of the series of missions dotting the California coast.
This is the 300th anniversary of the Spanish missionary's birth and it's being marked with an ambitious exhibit at the Huntington Library near Pasadena. It reveals a lot about the man, but also about the native people who were here long before Serra's arrival.
For the California Report, Steven Cuevas got a sneak preview.
State of Affairs: California bills, new LAPD commissioners and more
Time for State of Affairs, our look at politics and government throughout California. To help us with that we're joined in studio now by KPCC political reporters Alice Walton and Frank Stoltze.
The legislative session is wrapping up in Sacramento, which means we're seeing a flurry of a bills. Everything from increasing the minimum wage to driver's licenses for undocumented Californians.
The Legislature also approved a compromise plan yesterday to deal with California's prison overcrowding. What's the compromise?
The L.A. County Sheriff's Department was back in the news this week. The federal government opened a civil investigation into the department because of allegations of abuse against inmates. What does this mean for the department and for the reelection campaign of Sheriff Lee Baca?
The civilian panel that oversees the Los Angeles Police Department has new members and its new president, Steve Soboroff, is already making news. What did Soboroff say to get such immediate attention?
Speaking of commissioners, the panel that oversees the Department of Water and Power has four new members. They were confirmed Wednesday by the L.A. City Council but it sounds like those confirmations came without a lot of questions about rates, labor practices, and infrastructure projects.
Alice Walton tells us what she discovered during her behind-the-scenes investigation this week at the mayor's office.
Could native bee species save the honeybee and agriculture?
America's honeybees are dying off at a fast rate because of a mysterious killer called Colony Collapse Disorder.
In the past seven years since it was first reported, about a third of America's honeybees have died off.
Those bees are needed to pollinate all sorts of crops we eat, like pumpkins, almonds, and apples.
Without these pollinators, farmers could lose $15 billion in crops.
But some experts are proposing an unusual solution: using lesser-known bee species and training them to do the job.
More people know about honeybees -- which are actually European transplants -- and bumblebees. But America is home to thousands of native bee species. Most of their habitat, however, was destroyed when humans began transforming the natural landscape for the purpose of large-scale farming.
In a piece for Scientific American magazine, contributor Hillary Rosner explains how scientists in California are figuring out ways to encourage native bee species to return, and lighten the pollinating load for honeybees.
CREE creates LED lightbulb to compete with incandescent market
There are roughly 500 million light bulbs in California, Incandescent bulbs account for 80 percent those in use. Incandescent bulbs give off a lovely warm light, but they're not the most energy efficient.
Now there's a new bulb is on the scene: the CREE bulb.
Its makers say it provides natural-looking light while using just a fraction of the energy of traditional bulbs. Electical engineer Margery Conner joins the show to tell us what's different about this bulb.
Dinner Party Download: Flying dogs, chickenless eggs and more
Every week we get your weekend conversation starters with Rico Gagliano and Brendan Newnam, the hosts of the Dinner Party Download podcast and radio show.
On tap this week:
A Hollywood studio where dogs learn to fly
There's no firm numbers on this, but it is a generally accepted fact that more people are taking their dogs onto airplanes. There's a place called Air Hollywood that specializes in only sets of airplanes, or airports, so they decided what a great idea to use their facilities when people aren't shooting there. They will let you bring your dog to their fake airport and planes an simulate flights so that your dog can be trained and get used to flying. It is $349 for a day-long class, which I guess the other option would be to be separated from your dog and put him in the cargo hold.
Chickenless eggs are now at Whole Foods
This week across California people will be able to buy artificial eggs. These are eggs made of plants and beans and the company is called Beyond Eggs. They're backed by PayPal billionaire Peter Thiel and Bill Gates. Eggs do amazing things, they can hold oil and water together in mayo, they can make muffins rise, and so he set himself this challenge to figure out a thing that doesn't involve animals that can replicate the taste, nutritional value and the cooking properties of an egg. This powder apparently tastes a lot like eggs and even has the coloring of eggs.
This week in 1961: America took aim at a new enemy: hurricanes
In 1962, taxpayer money was being put toward a project called "Project Stormfury" which was designed to eradicate hurricanes. It was based on what was, at the time, considered pretty possible science, which was dropping silver iodide into clouds. It's a little bit complicated science, but the idea is that if you put silver iodide at the edge of a tornado, it would create another larger tornado outside the original one, and it would squeeze the life out of the original tornado and the new one would be slower. Which is pretty cool, except that over the course of 10 years they flew a bunch of flights and only got to do this to two hurricanes. They figured out that any changes it was causing probably would have happened anyway.
Rockabye Baby transforms rock and hip-hop hits into lullabies for babies
Let's say you love raucous music like rock n roll, heavy metal, rap and hip hop. But you also have a little one at home. What to do?
Well, you might want to check out a line of records called Rockabye Baby. They've made lullaby versions of artists ranging from U2 and the Beatles to Coldplay and Muse.
We talk to Lisa Roth, president of CMH Label Group, the record company behind Rockabye.