Tag Archives: government

The present period of very low interest rates is widely assumed to be temporary, a consequence of the 2008 financial crisis and subsequent central bank action. Because of this, as the financial crisis fades into the mists of time, there is growing political pressure for "normalisation" of interest rates. Here, for example, is William Hague warning that central banks must start to raise rates or face losing their independence: The only way out is for the US Fed to summon the courage to lead...

"Best diss of the Quantity Theory of Money comes from Keynes", commented Toby Nangle on Twitter, referring to this paragraph from Keynes's Open Letter to Roosevelt (Toby's emphasis): The other set of fallacies, of which I fear the influence, arises out of a crude economic doctrine commonly known as the Quantity Theory of Money. Rising output and rising incomes will suffer a set-back sooner or later if the quantity of money is rigidly fixed. Some people seem to infer from this that output...

I'm bored.Bored with this crisis. Bored with endless calls for bank reforms. Bored with never-ending stories of inadequate bank resolution and legal battles which benefit no-one but lawyers. Bored with ineffectual monetary policy and fiscal gridlock. Bored with seeing the same things proposed over and over again, even things we know don't work and will never happen.Today, Mike Konczal wrote a piece on why restoring Glass-Steagall wouldn't solve anything. He's right, of course. But it is now...

And particularly in Europe, as this chart shows: The ratings agency Standard & Poors has called for governments everywhere to increase investment spending. It also says they need to improve the efficiency of the spending they are already doing.  Private sector investment spending all over the world fell after the 2008 financial crisis. In Europe, where the crisis started earlier, it started falling in 2007. And it has not recovered. Private sector investors remain risk-averse and...

Daiwa Securities has forecast Armageddon. They say that over-investment in China in recent years has created a debt bubble so great that Chinese authorities would not able to manage its collapse, resulting in a debt deflationary spiral which would make 2008 look like a walk in the park. Such a meltdown would, in their words, "send the global economy into a tailspin".But they also outline another scenario, in which China's economy undergoes a nasty, possibly prolonged recession, from which...

Jeremy Corbyn’s “People’s QE” scheme has been extensively discussed in the media. In fact it has caused something of a storm. The FT’s Chris Giles did an excellent balanced analysis of it, and there have also been useful contributions from – among others - Oxford University’s Simon Wren-Lewis, The Economist’s Buttonwood and FT Alphaville’s Matt Klein. The extent of discussion is far more, in my view, than the scheme deserves. The scheme envisages that the Government, via a public...