The man who invented the Fed’s magic trick just died. His successor is about to try it again

Alan Greenspan testifying before the Senate Banking Committee. (Credit: Bettmann—Getty Images)

Some of the most consequential decisions in the global economy of the 1990s were worked out in a bathtub.

Alan Greenspan, who died Monday at 100 from complications of Parkinson’s, had a bad back. He soaked it at dawn in a deep tub at home, thinking through the economy before the day began, and it was there, said Peter Petre, the former Fortune editor who co-wrote his memoir, where his best ideas were formed, including the famous phrase “irrational exuberance.”