Category Archives: Uncategorized

I enjoyed Simon Wren Lewis’ excellent post on this on MainlyMacro.   A few points by way of a post-script. 1.  Simon comes close to giving the impression that the only conclusion you can reach from ‘mainstream’ textbook models is that … Continue reading →

Last night, watching Goldmans’ explain carefully that a UK exit from the EU would be one of the things they would consider in locating their HQ, it struck me that we have seen many such interviews, and all of them … Continue reading →

I wrote before about how worries about a possible default or interruption in payments on US debt, resulting from Congress failing to agree a rise in the debt-ceiling, destroy money and liquidity.  Just to tease two things out of the … Continue reading →

Thinking ahead to the next round of the debt-ceiling talks in February.  Republican negotiators may be worrying that they are losing credibility.  The first time they extracted real concessions from Democrats.  This time they got nothing of note and appeared … Continue reading →

I have, occasionally, pointed out things that the Bank has done well in this blog.  However, it’s fair to say that most of what I have done is to detail things I think could be done differently.  But in case … Continue reading →

I heard an interesting tale during my Riksbank visit, from Karolina Ekholm, Deputy Governor.  She explained to me that in the immediate aftermath of the crisis, the Swedish debt management office were OVER-issuing government debt [ie selling more than they … Continue reading →

In this post I explained why I thought that the fight over the debt ceiling acted like a monetary contraction (as well as, ironically for the Tea Party, acting like a wealth tax).  The argument, made by others too, is … Continue reading →

Simon Wren Lewis writes ‘in defence of forward guidance‘.  He scolds Chris Giles, myself and others for ‘panning’ the Bank of England, for fear that it might retreat away from this bold experiment back into its natural, conservative, and insular … Continue reading →

MPC have stressed that their version of Forward Guidance, unlike the original Woodfordian policy to which the term normally refers, is quite different.  Unlike the Woodfordian policy, the Bank of England are not communicating that rates would be lower for … Continue reading →

Folks.  I found myself in a tricky position when I arrived.  The bosses in Whitehall were really taken with this thing about keeping interest rates lower for longer, and, frankly, since there was no way they could loosen fiscal policy, … Continue reading →