Hausmann, Ricardo, (2015), “Don’t Fear the IMF”, Project Syndicate, 28 September The International Monetary Fund is, in many places, the organization that everybody loves to hate. According to some, the IMF is bad for the poor, women, economic stability, and the environment. Joseph Stiglitz, whose influence is amplified by his Nobel Prize, blames the IMF for causing and then worsening the economic crises it was called on to resolve. The …Read More

Burda, Michael, (2015), “Dispelling three myths on economics in Germany”, Voxeu publications, 23 September Many analysts believe that German economists hold a very different view of macroeconomics. This column presents a personal view why this belief is wrong. The fact that Europe still consists of sovereign nations and that most Europeans still want to keep it that way informs much of what happens inside German economists’ heads. Relevant Posts Heise, Michael, …Read More

Kaletsky, Anatole, (2015), “Why the Fed Buried Monetarism”, Project Syndicate, 22 September The US Federal Reserve’s decision to delay an increase in interest rates should have come as no surprise to anyone who has been paying attention to Fed Chair Janet Yellen’s comments. The Fed’s decision merely confirmed that it is not indifferent to international financial stress, and that its risk-management approach remains strongly biased in favor of “lower for …Read More

Dietsch, Peter, (2015), “Common rules (not rates) should be the answer to tax competition in the EU”, LSE blog, 23 September The creativity of rich individuals and their tax advisors to hide private wealth in tax havens such as Switzerland or the Isle of Man knows hardly any bounds. Just as unethical, though often legal, are the multiple techniques multinational corporations use to shift profits to low-tax jurisdictions such as Luxembourg. …Read More

Qureshi, Zia, (2015), “Growing Out of Inequality”, Project Syndicate, 22 September Income inequality has been increasing in most major economies – and in many of them, it has been increasing significantly. This is a cause for growing concern, and rightly so: inequality not only can undermine an economy’s long-term growth prospects; it can restrain growth in the short term by depressing aggregate demand. Relevant Posts Münch, Richard, (2015), ” The Global Division …Read More