Pissarides, C., (2013), “The Euro Should Be Growth Friendly or Be Dismantled”, Social Europe Journal, 16 December. Nobel laureate Christopher Pissarides was once a passionate believer in the benefits of European monetary union. In light of the damaging effects of the Eurozone crisis, he now writes that the euro requires urgent reforms to restore its credibility. He argues that the single currency should either be dismantled in an orderly way, …Read More

Eichengreen, B., (2013), “The ECB’s Bridge Too Far”, Project Syndicate, 10 December. Is Europe’s economic crisis mutating once again? If debt fears are now being superseded by the danger of deflation, as recent data suggest, the European Central Bank has its work cut out for it – and there is nothing to suggest that it is up to the task. The numbers are alarming. Core inflation (the consumer price index …Read More

Fatas, A., (2013), “Debt and secular stagnation”, Antonia Fatas on the Global Economy Blog, 10 December. In a recent post Paul Krugman refers to the potential link between rising levels of debt prior to the 2008 crisis and the current discussion on secular stagnation. The argument can be illustrated by the chart below (borrowed from Krugman’s post). Quoting from Krugman’s post: “Debt was rising by around 2 percent of GDP …Read More

Brousseau, V., Chailloux, A. and Durré, A., (2013), “The LIBOR scandal: What’s next ? A possible way forward”, VoxEU, 09 December. In the aftermath of the LIBOR scandal, it is important to re-establish a credible reference rate for the pricing of financial instruments and of wholesale and retail loans. The new candidate must meet the five criteria suggested by the Bank for International Settlements – reliability, robustness, frequency, availability, and …Read More

Barnichon, R., (2013), “Unemployment Likely to Continue to Decline; Don’t Read Much into October Employment Report”, Brookings, Brookings on Job Numbers Blog, 05 December. This post discusses my monthly update of the Barnichon-Nekarda model.  For an introduction to the basic concepts used in this post, read my introductory post (Full details are available here.) In September, the unemployment rate increased to 7.3%, 0.2 percentage points higher than the model had …Read More

Stiglitz, J., (2013), “An Agenda to Save the Euro”, Project Syndicate, 04 December. It has been three years since the outbreak of the euro crisis, and only an inveterate optimist would say that the worst is definitely over. Some, noting that the eurozone’s double-dip recession has ended, conclude that the austerity medicine has worked. But try telling that to those in countries that are still in depression, with per capita …Read More