Reports of Professor Enrico Colombatto
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Post-Covid recovery is not the main challenge ahead
The statistics describing the condition of the world economy three months after the lockdowns seem reassuring: We have not had a V-shaped recovery but GDP growth in the second part of 2020 appears to be firming up and predictions for 2021 are optimistic. However, trouble is brewing in labor markets.
Causes and consequences of the dollar’s weakness
At the pandemic’s onset, few paid any attention to exchange rates. The U.S. dollar has weakened significantly since March 2020, surprising many observers. Some of the drop can be ascribed to the diminished international trade flows, which cut the demand for the globe’s leading exchange currency. There may also be, ...
Capping dividends and stopping buybacks: Governments want pessimism
Through its policies, the U.S. Federal Reserve is implying that the banking sector is in danger. By curbing dividends and prohibiting buybacks, it will force banks to accumulate large amounts of cash, insulating them against bank runs that may never come. In fact, the likeliest outcome is that U.S. banks ...
Relevance beyond the crisis: Growth after the lockdown
The economic consequences of the coronavirus mostly derive from lockdowns. Shutting down production, especially, is responsible for the downturn. The shock has kept people from spending, of course – but only temporarily. Saving now is only spending put off for another day. Policies intended to discourage that saving could backfire. ...
Relevance beyond the crisis: Globalization is not going away
Contrary to the popular narrative, the COVID-19 crisis has not convinced companies that globalization is a bad move. In fact, the lesson of the pandemic is that firms need to broaden their supply chains and diversify their providers. Governments, however, will take advantage of the situation to push nationalization and ...
Reforming capitalism: A fight built on envy
It has become common to blame capitalism for climate change and wealth inequality. However, the premises underlying the debate around the issue are profoundly misguided – the current system is far from aligned with free-market prescriptions. But despite their skewed view of reality, advocates of government intervention are likely to ...
Relevance beyond the crisis: Strategies for the euro
Pumping still more liquidity into Europe’s pandemic-frozen economy hardly addresses underlying problems, but this happens to be the most politically palatable strategy that Brussels could pursue. How EU leaders go about financing the massive new outlays, however, is a tricky question. The most likely borrowing scheme will have long-term consequences ...
COVID-19 and the future of central banking
As the coronavirus pandemic freezes large swaths of the economy, the world’s three most important central banks find themselves under tremendous political pressure to flood the markets with easy money again. Their approaches may prove significantly different.
