Tag Archives: austerity

So and old post was getting lots of hits. Turns out some guy linked to it a while ago. Not sure why this happened only now, after 2 years. If Google Translate is accurate (my experience is that it's not always the case) this is what he says: "Social geographer Ewald Engelen is a Keynesian. Throw money at the economy and everything will be fine, is his theory. He fulminates and tweets all day that the government must spend. This morning Ewald put a link to the Naked Keynesianism, a site that...

Anti-austerity demonstrators in Helsinki, Finland The ratings agency Fitch has affirmed the AAA rating on Finland's sovereign debt. But on reading Fitch's analysis, the justification for this is very hard to see.Finland's economic situation is, to say the least, dire.  This is what Fitch has to say about it: The Finnish economy is adjusting to sector-specific shocks in key industries (electronics, communications and forestry), is already experiencing the impact of an ageing population...

After almost seven years of relative calm and stability, a stock market crash is finally upon us. This is a very predictable crash stemming from a very widely known cause. Hundreds of analysts including myself — following the trail illuminated by Michael Pettis — have for a long time been banging on about a Chinese slowdown gathering an uncontrollable momentum, sending China into a panic, and infecting global markets. What’s less clear yet is whether this is a correction or a crisis. My...

Eurozone growth figures came out today. And they are horribly disappointing. Everyone undershot, apart from Spain which turned in a remarkable 1% quarter's growth, and Greece which somehow managed an even more incredible 0.8% (yes, I will write about this, but not in this post). France  didn't grow at all, Italy all but stagnated at 0.2%, and even the mighty Germany only managed 0.4%. Despite low oil prices, falling commodity prices, weak Euro and the ECB's QE programme, Eurozone...

This is the British UKIP leader Nigel Farage speaking in the European Parliament a few days ago when the Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras was present.[embedded content]And, no, I haven’t gone conservative, nor would I endorse UKIP’s domestic economic policies – which would involve a nasty dose of neoliberal poison, probably worse than the conventional neoliberalism. And, yes, we all know well that some people who vote for UKIP are xenophobic and bigoted. They also have an unhinged...

Guest post by Tom StreithorstVladimir Illych Lenin may well be the most destructive political theorist of the 20th century.  His glorification of a conspiratorial party as agent of a glorious future legitimised mass murder from Bolshevik Russia to Nazi Germany to Cambodia's Khmer Rouge.  Nonetheless, he did invent an analytical tool political scientists and economists should use more often: “Kto Kovo”, or “who beats whom”.  In examining any policy, Lenin suggests the first...

I mean in an economic context.People sometimes seem confused about what it means, but I don’t find it problematic. In an economic context, “austerity” has this sense: (1) a situation where the net effect of a government budget (in all its aspects whether spending or taxation, etc.) is contractionary fiscal policy in which aggregate demand is reduced or drained from the economy. E.g., the fiscal policy of Greece and Ireland after 2008 was an example of this type of austerity. However,...

In-depth analysis on Credit Writedowns Pro. By Marc Chandler Through the venomous comments and erosion of trust, the broad framework of what couple prove to be a workable compromise over Greece’s financial crisis may be emerging.   This is not to suggest that the eurozone finance ministers meeting will reach any important decision. Indeed, the Greek Prime Minister has already reduced his finance minister’s role in the negotiations, and it appears Merkel has done something vaguely...

In-depth analysis on Credit Writedowns Pro. You are here: Economy » How do you say “dead cat” in Latvian? By Frances Coppola This, my third post on Latvia, looks at its recovery from the 2008-9 recession. Latvia is often held up as the “poster child” for harsh austerity measures as the means of returning to strong economic growth. In order to hold its currency peg to the Euro, it embarked on a brutal front-loaded fiscal consolidation in 2009, sacking public sector workers, slashing public...

This, my third post on Latvia, looks at its recovery from the 2008-9 recession.Latvia is often held up as the "poster child" for harsh austerity measures as the means of returning to strong economic growth. In order to hold its currency peg to the Euro, it embarked on a brutal front-loaded fiscal consolidation in 2009, sacking public sector workers, slashing public sector salaries, cutting benefits and raising taxes. Between 2010 and 2013 it cut its fiscal deficit from 10% of GDP to a...