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The world economy
Out of ammo?
Central bankers are running down their arsenal. But other options exist to stimulate the economy
Feb 20th 2016 | Fromthe print edition
WORLD stock markets arein bear territory. Gold, a haven in times of turmoil, has had its best start to a year in more than three decades. Thecost of insurance against bank default has surged. Talk of recession in America is rising, as is the implied probability that the FederalReserve, which raised rates only in December, will be forced to take them backbelow zero.
One fear above all stalks the markets: that the rich world’sweapon against economic weakness no longer works. Ever since the crisis of2007-08, the task of stimulating demand has fallen to central bankers. Theapogee of their power came in 2012, when Mario Draghi, boss of the EuropeanCentral Bank (ECB), said he would do “whatever it takes” to save the euro. Bondmarkets rallied and the sense of crisis receded.
But only temporarily. Despite central banks’ efforts,recoveries are still weak and inflation is low. Faith in monetary policy iswavering. As often as they inspire confidence, central bankers sow fear.Negative interest rates in Europe and Japan make investors worry about bankearnings, sending share prices lower. Quantitative easing (QE, the printing ofmoney to buy bonds) has led to a build-up of emerging-market debt that is nowthreatening to unwind. For all the cheapmoney, the growth in bank credit has been dismal. Pay deals reflectexpectations of endlessly low inflation, which favours that very outcome.Investors fret that the world economy is being drawn into another downturn, andthat policymakers seeking to keeprecession at bay have run out of ammunition.
Bazooka boo-boo
The good news is thatmore can be done to jolt economies fromtheir low-growth, low-inflation torpor (see Briefing). Plenty of policiesare left, and all can pack a punch.The bad news is that central banks will need help from governments. Until now,central bankers have had to do the heavylifting because politicians have been shamefully reluctant to share theburden. At least some of them have failed to grasp the need to have fiscal andmonetary policy operating in concert. Indeed,many governments actively worked against monetary stimulus by embracingausterity.
The time has come forpoliticians to join the fight alongside central bankers. The most radicalpolicy ideas fuse fiscal and monetary policy. One such option is to financepublic spending (or tax cuts) directly by printing money—known as a “helicopterdrop”. Unlike QE, a helicopter drop bypasses banks and financial markets, andputs freshly printed cash straight into people’s pockets. The sheer recklessness of this would, in theory, encourage peopleto spend the windfall, not save it.(A marked change in central banks’ inflation targets would also help: see Freeexchange.)
Another set of ideas seek to influence wage- andprice-setting by using a government-mandated incomes policy to pull economies from the quicksand. Theidea here is to generate across-the-board wage increases, perhaps by using taxincentives, to induce a wage-price spiral of the sort that, in the 1970s,policymakers struggled to escape.
All this involves risks. A world of helicopter drops isanathema to many: monetary financing is prohibited by the treaties underpinningthe euro, for example. Incomes policies are even more problematic, as theyreduce flexibility and are hard to reverse. But if the rich world ends up stuckin deflation, the time will come to contemplate extreme action, particularly inthe most benighted economies, such as Japan’s.
Elsewhere, governments can make use of a less risky tool:fiscal policy. Too many countries with room to borrow more, notably Germany,have held back. Such Swabian frugality is deeply harmful. Borrowing has never been cheaper. Yields on more than $7 trillionof government bonds worldwide are now negative. Bond markets and ratingsagencies will look more kindly on the increase in public debt if there arefresh and productive assets on the other side of the balance-sheet. Above all,such assets should involve infrastructure. The case for locking in long-termfunding to finance a multi-year programme to rebuild and improve tatty publicroads and buildings has never been morepowerful.
A fiscal boost would packmore of a punch if it was coupled with structural reforms that work withthe grain of the stimulus. European banks’ balance-sheets still needstrengthening and, so long as questions swirl about their health, the bankswill not lend freely. Write-downs of bad debts are one option, but it might bebetter to overhaul the rules so that governments can insist that banks eitherraise capital or have equity forced on them by regulators.
Deregulation is another priority—and no less potent forbeing familiar. The Council of Economic Advisors says that the share ofAmerica’s workforce covered by state-licensing laws has risen to 25%, from 5%in the 1950s. Much of this red tape is unnecessary. Zoning laws are a barrierto new infrastructure. Tax codes remainByzantine and stuffed with carve-outs that shelter the income of the better-off,who tend to save more.
It’s the politics,stupid
The problem, then, is not that the world has run out ofpolicy options. Politicians have knownall along that they can make a difference, but they are weak and tooquarrelsome to act. America’s political establishment is riven; Japan’spoliticians are too timid to confront lobbies; and the euro area seemsinstitutionally incapable of uniting around new policies.
If politicians fail to act now, while they still have time,a full-blown crisis in markets will force action upon them. Although that wouldbe a poor outcome, it would nevertheless be better than the alternative. Thegreatest worry is that falling markets and stagnant economies hand politicalpower to the populists who have grown strong on the back of the crisis of2007-08. Populists have their own solutions to economic hardship, which includeprotectionist tariffs, windfall taxes, nationalisation and any number ofruinous schemes.
Behind the worry that central banks can no longer exertcontrol is an even deeper fear. It is that liberal, centrist politicians are not up to the job.
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