Tag Archives: Contributions

In its April 2017 Quarterly Report, the Deutsche Bundesbank discusses the role of banks in the creation of money. Findings from a wavelet analysis indicate that in Germany, money and credit move in parallel in the long run. In an appendix, the report mentions possible welfare costs of curbing maturity transformation, with reference to Diamond and Dybvig’s work. This is not convincing. Unlike in the typical (microeconomic) banking model, aggregate central bank provided money need not be...

In a Peterson Institute working paper, Jeromin Zettelmeyer, Eike Kreplin, and Ugo Panizza conclude that the answer to that question depends on your assumptions. The authors compare several scenarios, including scenarios A–C, the baseline scenario of the European institutions and two more pessimistic variants; scenario I which underlies the IMF reasoning and which assumes that “Greece will not undertake the structural reforms needed to achieve higher potential growth”; and scenario D,...

On his blog, John Cochrane discusses the possibility of an alternative monetary policy regime in which the Fed tightly controls expected inflation. He states, repeatedly, that given our current understanding of the matter he would refrain from implementing such a regime if he became Fed chair (rather than stating that he would not currently advise to move in that direction). Given that Janet Yellen is expected to retire next year and John Cochrane is mentioned as a possible successor, I...

The European Financial Review, February-March 2017. HTML, PDF. See the VoxEU article.

In another excellent post on Moneyness, J P Koning likens the monetary system to the plot in the movie Inception, featuring a dream piled on a dream piled on a dream piled on a dream. Koning explains that [l]ike Inception, our monetary system is a layer upon a layer upon a layer. Anyone who withdraws cash at an ATM is ‘kicking’ back into the underlying central bank layer from the banking layer; depositing cash is like sedating oneself back into the overlying banking layer. Monetary...

In separate blog posts, Russ Roberts and John Cochrane have called for humility on the part of economists. Asking “What do economists know?,” Roberts and Cochrane point out—correctly—that economics is not as strong on quantification as some economists and many pseudo economists pretend, and as is often expected from economists. Economics is not the same as applied statistics although the latter can help clarify, at least to some extent, the empirical relevance of economic theories....

Presentation at the Liechtenstein Institute about the Vollgeld initiative, the blockchain revolution, and their possible effects on banks and the monetary system. Report in Liechtensteiner Vaterland, February 1, 2017. HTML. Interview in Wirtschaft Regional, February 4, 2017. PDF.

That’s what Daron Acemoglu and Pascual Restrepo document in an NBER working paper. Figure 2 [below] provides a glimpse of the relevant pattern by depicting the raw correlation between the change in GDP per capita between 1990 and 2015 and the change in the ratio of the population above 50 to the population between the ages of 20 and 49. … even when we control for initial GDP per capita, initial demographic composition and differential trends by region, there is no evidence of a negative...

Die Volkswirtschaft 1–2 2017, December 21, 2016. HTML, PDF. Banning inside money creation would be unnecessary, insufficient, not enforceable, and besides the point. The way forward is to grant everyone access to central bank reserves and let investors choose between reserves and deposits.

Kosten eines Vollgeld-Systems sind hoch Eine Umsetzung der Vollgeld-Initiative würde grossen Schaden anrichten und dürfte im Ergebnis selbst die Initianten enttäuschen. Verbesserungen verspricht dagegen eine «sanfte» Reform: die Einführung von elektronischem SNB-Geld für alle. Der Präsident des Vereins Monetäre Modernisierung Hansruedi Weber (Mitte) und zwei verkleidete Aktivisten reichen im Dezember 2015 bei der...