Harvard economist Kenneth Rogoff knows what a financial crisis looks like. He studied 800 years of crises with fellow economist Carmen Reinhart. In this pandemic, Rogoff sees the global economy possibly headed for a Depression-era like hit, with emerging markets, corporate debt and an election year making the situation more precarious.

FN's sister title Barron’s spoke with Rogoff — who co-wrote This Time Is Different: Eight Centuries of Financial Folly with Reinhart in 2009 — about how this coronavirus crisis compares with the Great Depression, how it could morph into a financial crisis, and what election years and crises have in common. This is an edited version of the discussion.