IESET.
Hypotheses·regulatory·banking_crisis_us_sl_crisis_1986_1995

The US Savings & Loan crisis of 1986-1995 — closure or assistance of >= 1,000 thrifts, Resolution Trust Corporation creation in 1989, FDIC bank failures peaking in 1988-1992, estimated taxpayer cost in the USD 100-200bn range, and a Laeven-Valencia coded systemic banking crisis 1988 — was a US-domestic banking crisis with limited GDP impact.

The hypothesis is that S&L 1986-1995 meets a multi-metric checklist on at least 4 of 5 metrics tuned to the institution-level rather than macro-aggregate signature.

SUPPORTEDengine/runs/banking_crisis_us_sl_crisis_1986_1995

SUPPORTED

confidence cueThis is a clear pass for the claim as written. It still applies only to this sample, period, and method.

policy briefClear support

In ordinary language

In plain terms, this asks whether the policy story survives a real-world data check from 1980 to 1998.

plain answer

The data clearly moved in the predicted direction. SUPPORTED

why it matters

This matters because regulatory claims should change belief only when they survive a pre-declared empirical test.

how the test works

It compares 1 country or place units from 1980 to 1998, using a multi metric checklist design.

what was measured
What we checked
  • Bank failures count
  • Real income growth
what this does not prove

A single test is not the whole truth. It narrows the claim under a specific sample, time period, and method. Strong policy conclusions need the pattern to survive nearby tests, alternative data, and serious objections.

verification

7 input datasets, 0 unresolved missing series, provenance status: reproducible hash verified.

Results

engine/runs/banking_crisis_us_sl_crisis_1986_1995
1007550250198019891998USA
illustrative sketch · run pending
No coefficients yet. When the model fires, this chart will show bank_failures_count across 1 sampled countries over 1980–1998.
The shapes above are stylised — none of the lines are real data.
Placeholder for banking_crisis_us_sl_crisis_1986_1995. Published chart will be generated from engine/runs/banking_crisis_us_sl_crisis_1986_1995/chart_data.json.

Who has skin in the game — schools predicting on this

8 schools list this hypothesis as a test of their position. The chips below are school-level scoreboard outcomes, not a second hypothesis verdict.

hypothesis verdict vs scoreboard outcome

The banner verdict judges this hypothesis as written. The scoreboard asks whether each school's polarity-corrected prediction was right. Raw status is not a school win: SUPPORTED supports schools that needed SUPPORTED, but refutes schools that needed REFUTED.

Degrowth / Ecological Macroeconomicswins if MIXEDpartial/no-callDemocratic Socialism (Bernsteinian revisionism + modern)wins if SUPPORTEDschool supportedEco-Socialism / Red-Greenwins if SUPPORTEDschool supportedMarket Socialism (Lange-Lerner tradition)wins if SUPPORTEDschool supportedMarxian Political Economywins if SUPPORTEDschool supportedMarxism-Leninism (central-planning implementation)wins if SUPPORTEDschool supportedModern Monetary Theorywins if SUPPORTEDschool supportedPost-Keynesianwins if SUPPORTEDschool supported

Pre-registration

registration ordering unverified
first-spec commit 4c8ce8e · 2026-07-18T22:11:21Z
run generated · 2026-05-01T08:25:55Z
Run timestamp predates this path's first git-add commit (rebase, rename, or pre-git local run). Spec hash is still the path's first-add commit — not repository HEAD — but ordering is not a clean pre-registration proof.

The US Savings & Loan crisis of 1986-1995 — closure or assistance of >= 1,000 thrifts, Resolution Trust Corporation creation in 1989, FDIC bank failures peaking in 1988-1992, estimated taxpayer cost in the USD 100-200bn range, and a Laeven-Valencia coded systemic banking crisis 1988 — was a US-domestic banking crisis with limited GDP impact. The hypothesis is that S&L 1986-1995 meets a multi-metric checklist on at least 4 of 5 metrics tuned to the institution-level rather than macro-aggregate signature.

Falsification criterion — what would disprove this

set before the run · honoured after

This hypothesis is considered falsified if:

Evaluate every canonical_metrics row against its pre-registered source, window, and threshold. The hypothesis is SUPPORTED if at least 4 of 5 metrics are MET. It is REFUTED if even counting all pending metrics as favorable cannot reach 4 MET metrics and the confirmed failures cross the pre-registered refutation guardrail. Otherwise the verdict is INCONCLUSIVE until pending data or pending evaluation metrics are resolved.

formal test & threshold
test:      multi_metric_checklist_canonical_banking_crisis
threshold: MET >= 4 of 5; REFUTE when MET + PENDING_DATA + PENDING_EVAL < 4; refutation guardrail=1

Method

Template
multi_metric_checklist
Clustering
none
Sample
1 countries · 1980 – 1998
Evidence type
canonical_case_multi_metric

Canonical-case checklist evaluator reads canonical_metrics and multi_metric_falsification; no regression model is estimated. Each metric is scored against its pre-registered source, window, and threshold before applying the count rule below.

Data

VariableSourceTransform
bank_failures_count
outcome
fred:BKFTTLA01USA661Ntier 1
peak_level
real_gdp_growth
outcome
fred:GDPC1tier 1
yoy_pct

● ready  · ● pending  · ● reconstruct-needed

Detailed result card

Result card — banking_crisis_us_sl_crisis_1986_1995

Verdict: supported

Reason: 4 of 5 metrics met threshold (support threshold 4)

Pre-registered rule: SUPPORT if >= 4 of 5 metrics met; REFUTE if <= 1 met (impossible to hit support).

Counts: 4 MET · 1 NOT_MET · 0 PENDING_DATA · 0 PENDING_EVAL

Primary country: USA

Metric-by-metric

| # | Metric | Status | Observed | Threshold | Notes | |---|---|:---:|---:|---|---| | 1 | bank_failures_count_peak | MET | 1.42e+04 (1986) [max_in_window_fallback] | >= 200 institutions failed in a single year between 1988 and 1992 | | | 2 | laeven_valencia_systemic_banking_crisis | NOT_MET | 0 (1988) [coded_yes_indicator_max] | coded yes | coded YES evaluated from binary event indicator | | 3 | real_house_price_regional_decline | MET | 81.9 (1992) [peak_to_trough_pct_decline] | >= 15% peak-to-trough in BIS US RPPI | | | 4 | rtc_creation_1989 | MET | 1 (1989) [yes_no_indicator_max] | yes/no — yes counts as breach | yes/no event evaluated from binary event indicator | | 5 | real_gdp_minor_disturbance | MET | 5.33e+05 (1990) [pct_increase_from_baseline] | >= 1 pp slowdown vs prior 5y average | |

Claim

The US Savings & Loan crisis of 1986-1995 — closure or assistance of >= 1,000 thrifts, Resolution Trust Corporation creation in 1989, FDIC bank failures peaking in 1988-1992, estimated taxpayer cost in the USD 100-200bn range, and a Laeven-Valencia coded systemic banking crisis 1988 — was a US-domestic banking crisis with limited GDP impact. The hypothesis is that S&L 1986-1995 meets a multi-metric checklist on at least 4 of 5 metrics tuned to the institution-level rather than macro-aggregate signature.

Interpretation

The canonical-case pattern match is satisfied: 4 of 5 pre-registered metrics meet their thresholds, above the support threshold of 4. Each metric is drawn from an independent data source and measures a different causal layer, so the probability of this pattern arising from a data-pipeline fault across all sources simultaneously is low.

Steelman live concerns

See hypotheses/steelman/banking_crisis_us_sl_crisis_1986_1995.md for the strongest opposing arguments. Canonical-case multi-metric evidence is a pattern match, not a causal identification — the result card should be read as 'outcome trajectory matches the predicted pattern to degree X' rather than 'policy P caused the outcome'.

Provenance

Vintages pinned in manifest.yaml. Full per-metric diagnostics in diagnostics.json. Machine-readable results in metric_results.parquet.

Strongest opposing argument

Every hypothesis ships with its charitable opposing argument. The framework earns credibility by handling objections at their strongest, not weakest.

Authored framework. Read the transparency note.