Financial 411: A View of the Economy from Bretton Woods

At the Bretton Woods Monetary Conference

It's been more than two years since the world financial system went into a tailspin. Most economies are now growing again, if sluggishly. But that certainly doesn't mean everything's fixed. Big players in government and banking gathered in New Hampshire over the weekend and on Monday to talk about lingering issues like "too big to fail" and "derivatives."

There's a symbolic element to the location of the conference. Bretton Woods is the same resort where leaders of the Allied Nations met in 1944 to plan for a post-war monetary system.

Marketplace special correspondent David Brancaccio attended the conference. He said there were two goals: assessing the restructuring of the economy, and looking at economics as a discipline. Brancaccio also talks about diverging views of the economy, and which prevailed at Bretton. Some say we've already made enough changes to the world financial system, and can continue to tinker and tweak. Another is that the changes so far, like the Dodd-Frank law, are woefully inadequate.

Markets

The Dow gained a point, to close at 12,381,
The Nasdaq fell nine points, ending the day at 2,772.
The S&P 500 dropped four points, to close at 1,324.