Mitchell, B. (2015) “Friday lay day – more snake oil from Brussels“, Bill Mitchell Blog, 16 January. It’s my Friday lay day blog. I am in Sri Lanka at present and will have some reports about that over the next 14 odd days. I was amazed overnight by the comments from IMF boss Lagarde who made overt political statements in an upcoming election year by claiming that David Cameron …Read More
De Grauwe, P. & Ji, Y. (2015) “Quantitative easing in the Eurozone: It’s possible without fiscal transfers“, VoxEU Organisation, 15 January. The ECB has been struggling to implement a programme of quantitative easing (QE) that would successfully target deflation. The main difficulty is political, stemming from opposition from German institutions. Their argument against is that a government bond buying programme by the ECB would mix fiscal and monetary policy. …Read More
Beblavý, Μ., Gros, D. & Maselli, I. (2015) “Reinsurance of National Unemployment Benefit Schemes“, Social welfare policies, CEPS Working Documents, Centre for European Policy Studies, 08 January. This study is a contribution to the debate around the creation of an unemployment insurance scheme for the EU/euro area by proposing an alternative mechanism to the Europeanisation of national insurance schemes. The authors make the case for a reinsurance mechanism and show that …Read More
Parramore, Lynn (2015) “Welcome to the Hunger Games, Brought to You by Mainstream Economics“, Institute for New Economic Thinking, 05 January. As a virulent strain of austerity capitalism takes over Europe, leaving shattered lives in its shadow, researchers Servaas Storm and C.W.M. Naastepad, Senior Lecturers in Economics at Delft University of Technology in The Netherlands, consider how things got so bad, what role economists and misguided policy-makers have played, …Read More
Darvas, Ζ. (2015) “The convergence dream 25 years on – half of the former communist countries did not converge to advanced EU countries from 1989-2014“, Bruegel Institute, 06 January. The 25th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin wall was widely celebrated – rightly so. The fall of communism opened the way for democracy, personal freedoms, security, lawfulness, fairness and economic efficiency, among others. The transition also raised hopes that …Read More
Cukierman, Α. (2015) “The Crisis and the renminbi’s international role“, VoxEU Organisation, 07 January. The Global Financial Crisis has increased the importance of the renminbi as an international currency. This column describes how the status of the remnibi has changed relative to that of the dollar and the euro. It also discusses what their future as future currencies would be. The author suggests that within 10 years, the renminbi …Read More
Frankel, J. (2014) “Why so many commodity prices are down in the US, yet up in Europe“, VoxEU Organisation, 24 Δεκεμβρίου. Commodity prices have been falling in the US. This column argues that monetary policy has played a determining role in the falling prices trend. Monetary tightening is highly anticipated in the US, which is likely to raise short-term interest rates. At the same time, the ECB and Bank …Read More
Birg, L. & Goeddeke, A. (2014) “Christmas economics: Challenging some common beliefs“, VoxEU Organisation, 24 December. Christmas may be not so merry as we hope. Economists have argued that gift giving is an inefficient way to allocate resources, and it is widely suggested that Christmas brings a peak in prices and the number of suicides, or even disrupts the business cycle. This column discusses some conventional wisdom about Christmas …Read More
Minelli, Ε. (2014) “Understanding Piketty: Merit and rent in a growing economy“, VoxEU Organisation, 19 December. Growth and inequality are back at the centre of the economic debate. This column presents a framework for interpreting Thomas Piketty’s data based on Paul Romer’s model of endogenous growth. Two balanced growth regimes are possible in this framework: one (‘merit’) with a low capital–output ratio, a high interest rate, and high growth; …Read More
Bordo, M. & Siklos, P. (2014) “Central-bank credibility, reputation and inflation targeting in historical perspective“, VoxEU Organisation, 12 December. Central bank credibility is critically linked to communication and commitment. This column analyses the historical evolution of credibility, showing its prewar peak and the subsequent dip from which it did not fully recover until the 1980s. Inflation targeting has played a key role in establishing credibility in both developed and …Read More
