It has been ten years since the failure of Lehman sent the global financial system into freefall. Why is this date different from any other date? No particular reason. But round-number anniversaries do have the virtue of giving people a reason to look back at experience, and maybe even learn from it.

So how does the crisis response look 10 years later? Well, it could have been worse. But it could and should have been much better.

And the question is, do we understand that? To which the answer is, what do you mean “we,” white man? Some of us understand the inadequacy of crisis response — but we pretty much always did. Meanwhile, those who stood in the way of doing what should have been done have, with notably rare exceptions, failed to face up to their errors and the consequences.

Let’s start with what went kind of right. Faced with an imminent financial meltdown, policymakers by and large did what needed to be done to limit the damage. Their actions included bank bailouts, which should have been fairer — too many bankers got bailed out along with their banks — but were effective. There were also many emergency provisions of credit, including little-known but crucial things like maintaining dollar credit lines to non-U.S. central banks.