Tag Archives: Draghi

The ECB’s Unprecedented Monetary Stimulus

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After the recent Draghi press conference announcing new measures to ease monetary policy in euroland, I responded to live questions from the Financial Times: “The ECB Eases,” podcast,  FT Hard Currency, June 5, 2014 (including regarding my proposal that the ECB should buy dollar bonds).

And also to questions in writing from El Mercurio, June 5:

• Many critics point that these measures do not solve the economic problems of the Eurozone and in that they only benefit the financial markets. Do you agree? read more

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Considering QE, Mario? Buy US Bonds, Not Eurozone Bonds

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         The ECB should further ease monetary policy.  Inflation at 0.8% across the eurozone is below the target of “close to 2%.”  Unemployment in most countries is still high and their economies weak.  Under current conditions it is hard for the periphery countries to bring their costs the rest of the way back down to internationally competitive levels as they need to do.  If inflation is below 1% euro-wide, then the periphery countries have to suffer painful deflation.  read more

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The Hour of the Technocrats

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The Hour of the Technocrats has arrived.   In desperation from debt crises that their gridlocked political systems have created, Italy and Greece both in November chose new Prime Ministers who are technocratic economists rather than politicians:   Mario Monti and Lucas Papademos, respectively.  One can even describe them as professors:  Monti has been president of the prestigious Bocconi University when not a European Commissioner in Brussels, and Papademos has been my colleague at Harvard Kennedy School in the year since he finished his term as Deputy Governor of the European Central Bank (even teaching a class I usually teach). read more

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