Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal
Policy Coordination
Edited by Boštjan Jazbec and Biswajit Banerjee
Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Monetary policy has become increasingly accommodative in response
to the global nancial crisis, relying on unconventional policies, such as
large-scale government bond purchases and negative interest rates in some
countries. Yet there is broad agreement that there are limits to the scope
of monetary policy actions and their eectiveness. Sustainable growth
and price stability will require a coherent, integrated policy strategy that
also includes contributions from scal and structural policies – as well as
appropriate policies to contain nancial risks.
This book contains the proceedings of the high-level seminar on
“Rethinking Monetary‒Fiscal Policy Coordination” organised by the
Bank of Slovenia and the International Monetary Fund on 19-20
May 2016 in Portorož, Slovenia. The seminar explored the thinking
of policymakers and academics on the roles and coordination of
monetary and scal policies in the European Union and elsewhere.
Three main topics were taken up in separate sessions: (i) principles and
practical experience in the coordination of monetary and scal policies;
(ii) scal policy implementation in the EU institutional framework and
implications for monetary policy; and (iii) conducting monetary policy
when scal space is limited.
Boštjan Jazbec is Governor and Biswajit Banerjee is Chief Economist
at the Bank of Slovenia, Ljubljana, Slovenia.
Proceedings of a seminar jointly organised by the
Bank of Slovenia and the International Monetary Fund
Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination Edited by Boštjan Jazbec and Biswajit Banerjee
9 789616 960120
ISBN 978-961-6960-12-0
Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Edited by
Boštjan Jazbec and Biswajit Banerjee
Proceedings of a seminar jointly organised by
the Bank of Slovenia and the International Monetary Fund
© 2017 Bank of Slovenia and International Monetary Fund.
Disclaimer: The views expressed in this book are those of the authors and
do not necessarily represent the views of either the Bank of Slovenia or the
International Monetary Fund (IMF), its Executive Board, or IMF management.
Typesetting and cover design by Anil Shamdasani (www.shamdasani.co.uk).
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RETHINKING monetary-scal policy coordination [Elektronski vir]:
proceedings of a seminar jointly organised by the Bank of Slovenia and
the International Monetary Fund / edited by Boštjan Jazbec and Biswajit
Banerjee. - El. knjiga. - Ljubljana : Bank of Slovenia, 2017
Način dostopa (URL):
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ISBN 978-961-6960-12-0 (pdf)
1. Jazbec, Boštjan
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Also available at:
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Table of contents
Acknowledgements iv
List of abbreviations v
Foreword vii
Opening remarks 1
Boštjan Jazbec, Governor, Bank of Slovenia
Giovanni Dell’Ariccia, Deputy Director, Research Department, IMF
Panel 1: The coordination of monetary and scal policy –
principles and practical experience
Summary of Panel 1 9
Presentations by Lead Speaker and Panellists 11
General discussion 31
Panel 2: Fiscal policy implementation in the EU institutional
framework and implications for monetary policy
Summary of Panel 2 41
Presentations by Lead Speaker and Panellists 45
General discussion 76
Panel 3: Conducting monetary policy when scal space is
limited
Summary of Panel 3 83
Presentations by Lead Speaker and Panellists 87
General discussion 129
Closing remarks 141
Fabrizio Coricelli, Paris School of Economics and CEPR
About the speakers 144
About the editors 151
Acknowledgements
First, and foremost, we would like to thank Marija Žiher for her painstaking
support in all stages of the preparation of the manuscript. We also thank the
following people for their key role in organising the seminar: Polona Flerin,
Karmen Juren, Tatjana Brunček and Ksenija Berdnik. Our thanks also go to
Anil Shamdasani for overseeing the production of the book.
List of abbreviations
BAMC Bank Asset Management Company
CBA Central Bank of Armenia
CDO collateralised debt obligation
CDS credit default swap
CEE Central and Eastern European
CNB Croatian Central Bank
CSR country-specic recommendations
CZK Czech koruna
EB extended benets
EC European Commission
ECB European Central Bank
ECOFIN Economic and Financial Aairs Council
EDP Excessive Decit Procedure
EFB European Fiscal Board
EFSF European Financial Stability Facility
EFW European Fiscal Watchdog
EMU European Monetary Union
ESA European System of National and Regional Accounts
ESCB European System of Central Banks
ESM European Stability Mechanism
EU European Union
EUC Emergency Unemployment Compensation
FDI foreign direct investment
Fed US Federal Reserve
FX foreign exchange
GDP gross domestic product
HICP Harmonised Index of Consumer Prices
IFI independent scal institution
IMF International Monetary Fund
LTRO longer-term renancing operation
NPL non-performing loan
OECD Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
OMT Outright Monetary Transactions
MoF ministry of nance
MTO Medium-term objective
NCB national central bank
SGP Stability and Growth Pact
QE quantitative easing
UK United Kingdom
US United States
ZLB zero lower bound
Foreword
In the aftermath of the global nancial crisis, policymakers in many countries
face considerable challenges in fostering sustained strong growth, price stability
and nancial stability. In general, economic recovery has been slow and ination
has stayed below accepted denitions of price stability. In response, monetary
policy has become increasingly accommodative, relying on unconventional
policies, such as large-scale government bond purchases and negative interest
rates in some countries. Yet there is broad agreement that there are limits
to the scope of monetary policy actions and their eectiveness. Sustainable
growth and price stability will require a coherent, integrated policy strategy
that also includes contributions from scal and structural policies – as well as
appropriate policies to contain nancial risks.
This book contains the proceedings of the high-level seminar on “Rethinking
Monetary‒Fiscal Policy Coordination” organised by the Bank of Slovenia
and the International Monetary Fund on 19-20 May 2016 in Portorož,
Slovenia. The seminar explored the thinking of policymakers and academics
on the roles and coordination of monetary and scal policies in the European
Union and elsewhere. Three main topics were taken up in separate sessions: (i)
principles and practical experience in the coordination of monetary and scal
policies; (ii) scal policy implementation in the EU institutional framework
and implications for monetary policy; and (iii) conducting monetary policy
when scal space is limited.
Speakers in the rst session underscored that central bank independence is a
cornerstone principle of modern economic policymaking. Independence is
critical for central bank credibility, which in turn is of paramount importance
for transmitting policy impulses to the economy. Independence also implies
that monetary–scal policy coordination will be achieved with the monetary
and scal authorities acting independently within their mandates. Participants
recognised the potential advantages, in some circumstances, of using scal
policy to support the demand-stabilising eorts of the central bank – but also
emphasised associated practical risks.
Participants in the second session noted that the EU’s scal policy framework
aims to ensure that no individual member state runs excessive decits or
builds up excessive debts. The increase in public debt experienced by many
European countries after the global nancial crisis – brought on both by the
deep recessions and the need to support their banking systems – constrains
scal policy’s ability to assist in output stabilisation. That said, countries with
scal space are well advised to use it as needed to assist monetary policy in
closing the negative output gaps and raising potential growth. And even in
countries without scal space, scal policy can still support growth by reducing
distortionary taxes and unproductive or poorly targeted expenditure while
increasing productive investment.
Finally, the last seminar session explored the challenges of conducting monetary
policy when scal space is limited, and the special diculties in the European
context. Monetary policy has to full its price stability mandate, keeping
ination close to target. With interest rates near zero, the substantial use of
unconventional monetary measures to stimulate domestic demand has been
appropriate. With such demand support, output gaps in Europe are gradually
closing. To raise growth further, structural policies that raise investment, labour
force participation and productivity need to pick up the torch.
We are grateful to Biswajit Banerjee for taking primary responsibility for
editing the proceedings of the seminar. Our thanks also go to Marija Žiher
for providing invaluable support in the preparation of the manuscript, to
Anil Shamdasani for excellent and swift handling of its production, as well as
to everyone who helped to make the seminar a success, in particular, Polona
Flerin.
Tobias Adrian Boštjan Jazbec
Financial Counsellor & Director Governor
Monetary and Capital Markets Department Bank of Slovenia
International Monetary Fund
Opening remarks
Boštjan Jazbec, Governor, Bank of Slovenia
It is a great pleasure to welcome you all to the high-level seminar on
“Rethinking Monetary‒Fiscal Policy Coordination” organised jointly by the
Bank of Slovenia and the International Monetary Fund. It is a great honour
to have a very distinguished gathering of central bank governors, senior
ocials of governments and international institutions, leading academics
and practitioners to discuss a very critical issue that occupies the minds of
policymakers in the euro area and elsewhere.
The objective of the seminar is to explore current thinking on the roles and
coordination of monetary and scal policies. The presentations and discussion
will focus on three main themes: (i) the principles and practical experience in the
coordination of monetary and scal policies; (ii) scal policy implementation
in the EU institutional framework and implications for monetary policy; and
(iii) conducting monetary policy when scal space is limited. I will now briey
touch on these themes in general terms.
Policymakers in the euro area face considerable challenges in fostering
sustained strong growth, price stability and nancial stability. Following
the onset of the global nancial crisis, economic recovery has been slow
and growth remains lacklustre. Ination is much below the medium-term
objective of lower than, but close to 2%. For some time now, ination has been
continually weaker than expected and market-based measures of ination
expectations stand at historical lows. Therefore, monetary policy has become
increasingly accommodative, relying on several non-standard measures and
negative interest rate policy.
There is broad agreement that in the current setting there are limits to the
scope of monetary policy actions and their eectiveness for lifting the euro area
economy. Concerns are mounting that the outlook may be one of a prolonged
period of low ination and low interest rates, which can adversely aect both
the real and nancial sectors. Therefore, many of us have emphasised on
numerous occasions that “monetary policy cannot be the only game in town”.
Strong sustainable growth, price stability and nancial stability will require
a coherent, integrated policy strategy that also includes scal and structural
policies.
2 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
The message on the importance of scal policy supporting monetary policy
is founded on historical precedence. In 1936, prescribing the way out of the
Great Depression, Keynes wrote:
“It seems unlikely that the inuence of [monetary] policy on the rate of interest
will be sucient by itself. I conceive, therefore, that a somewhat comprehensive
socialization of investment will prove the only means of securing an approximation
to full employment.”
1
These words are very relevant at the current juncture as well.
The ECB has emphasised that scal policies should support the economic
recovery while remaining in full compliance with the EU’s scal rules.
Otherwise, credibility in the scal framework cannot be maintained. A
critical question, therefore, is whether the prevailing rules could be barriers
to achieving the desired coordination of monetary and scal policies.
There are two key prerequisites for obtaining eective scal support to monetary
policy within the Stability and Growth Pact rules. Governments must have
adequate scal space, and scal policy must ensure the sustainability of public
nances. In both respects, there appears to be little room for a meaningful
scal expansion within the existing rules. There is broad agreement that the
scal framework has failed to ensure long-term sustainability while avoiding
procyclical scal behaviour. Countries did not build up sucient scal space
during the pre-crisis expansionary period, and scal space narrowed following
the onset of the nancial crisis. Public debt increased sharply during the
crisis years and the policy focus turned to an austerity mode when market
pressures heightened. Most of the euro area countries still face long-term
scal sustainability issues and are expected to keep their scal consolidation
eorts, in terms of the cyclically adjusted decit, ongoing. In 2016, only four
countries – namely, Germany, Luxembourg, Cyprus and Estonia – have scal
space for additional discretionary measures according to the Stability and
Growth Pact rules.
What then is the way forward? It has been emphasised on many occasions
that for countries without scal space, scal policy can still support demand
by altering the composition of the budget. In particular, it has been pointed
out that consideration should be given to cutting distortionary taxes and
unproductive expenditure and to increasing investments that improve total
factor productivity over the medium term. Investment and structural reforms
that increase the growth potential of the economy create scal space by raising
future government revenues. It should be noted that some of these measures
1 Keynes, J.M. (1936), The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money, London: Macmillan & Co., Chapter 24.
Opening remarks
3
will require political resolve and social support, as they are likely to aect social
entitlements. Some analysts have remarked that these measures will not have
much impact in the short term.
Should there be a rethinking of the monetary policy framework? In a recent
blog in April 2016, former Chairman of the Federal Reserve, Ben Bernanke,
argued that:
“under certain extreme circumstances - [such as] sharply decient aggregate demand,
exhausted monetary policy, and unwillingness of [scal authorities] to use debt-
nanced scal policies - [money-nanced scal programs, colloquially known as
helicopter drops] may be the best available alternative” and that “it would be
premature to rule them out”.
2
Earlier in this vein, in 2003, Bernanke had recommended that Japan ght
deation through an expansionary scal policy nanced by permanent
purchases of government debt by the central bank. The permanency of central
bank purchases of public debt rules out that the new debt will ever be placed on
the market, thereby eliminating Ricardian equivalence eects and preventing
new public debt accumulation.
However, an essential aspect of money-nanced scal programmes is that they
involve revocation or suspension of central bank independence. Precisely for
this reason, and because governance of money-nanced scal programmes is
inherently dicult (since it creates perverse incentives for legislators to facilitate
tax cuts or spending when such actions no longer make macroeconomic sense),
this option is not something that central banks in general are discussing or
even considering.
In the euro area, the principle of central bank independence is one of the
cornerstones of the economic policy constitution enshrined in the Maastricht
Treaty. A fundamental expectation is that monetary–scal policy coordination
will be achieved with dierent institutions acting independently within their
mandates. To preserve this framework, the focus should be on improving the
governance structure so as to ensure that the euro area does not gradually slide
into a regime of scal dominance. Within the constraint of its given mandate,
the ECB has moved towards improving the policy mix through the expansion
of its balance sheet aimed at stimulating economic activity.
It is my sincere hope that the seminar will provide a useful springboard for
moving forward with bolder policy actions and reforms that will help put the
euro area on a path of strong sustained growth and price stability.
2 www.brookings.edu/blog/ben-bernanke/2016/04/11/what-tools-does-the-fed-have-left-part-3-helicopter-money/.
4 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Giovanni Dell’Ariccia, Deputy Director, Research Department,
International Monetary Fund
3
Let me start by thanking Governor Jazbec and the Bank of Slovenia for their
hospitality. Let me also welcome you all on behalf of the IMF’s side of the
organising committee. It is a pleasure and a privilege to be at this high-level
seminar with so many distinguished participants.
I would like to discuss three inter-related issues that I am sure will be addressed
in much greater detail in the seminar sessions today and tomorrow. My aim
is more to ask questions than to provide answers, as I feel there are many in
this room far more qualied than me to provide the latter.
The rst issue is central bank independence and how it came to be. I will discuss
in general terms the idea that monetary policy can and should be delegated
to a separate agency protected from short-term political pressures, and that it
should be set independently from the scal stance.
The second issue is how the post-crisis experience has challenged this model.
In particular, I will touch upon how the need to deviate from the pre-crisis
consensus model has reignited pressures on central banks and potentially led
to threats to their independence.
Finally, I would like to reect on the potential role for coordination between
scal and monetary policy when there is limited scal space and conditions
are close to a liquidity trap. In that context, I will briey discuss “helicopter
money”, on which I think my views are in line with those of Governor Jazbec.
The pre-crisis consensus and central bank independence
During the 25 or so years before the crisis, we thought of monetary policy as
having one target (namely, ination) and one instrument (namely, the policy
rate). As long as ination was stable, the output gap was likely to be small and
stable and monetary policy did its job. We thought of scal policy as playing
a secondary countercyclical role, with political-economy constraints sharply
limiting its usefulness. This is a bit of a caricature, but not too far from the
consensus view prevailing at the time.
Looking at it in more detail, monetary policy had a simple mandate: price
stability. Stable and low ination was presented as the primary, if not exclusive,
target of central banks (sometimes with output or unemployment as a secondary
3 The views in this presentation are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of the IMF, its
management, or its Executive Board.
Opening remarks
5
target). This was the result of a coincidence between the reputational need of
central bankers to focus on ination rather than activity and their desire, at
the time, to decrease ination from the high levels of the 1970s.
This view also was rooted in a strong intellectual framework. First, there was
a well-understood time inconsistency for scal authorities with the temptation
to inate public debt away, as in the Barro-Gordon model.
4
Second, in the
New Keynesian models, typically characterised by nominal rigidities as the
only frictions, a divine coincidence emerged (as Olivier Blanchard and Jordi Gali
called it)
5
– the best monetary policy can do when facing demand shocks
is to maintain ination stable. In practice, this also meant low. This would
automatically guarantee the lowest output gap, or the same level of activity
that would prevail in the absence of nominal rigidities.
Since we had a measurable target – the ination rate – the central bank could
be easily held accountable for its actions while at the same time it could be
vindicated against undue criticism. For instance, the central bank could show
after a tightening that the ination rate was right below the target. Thus,
it could more easily resist ex ante pressures to keep monetary policy on an
excessively easy stance.
There was also another simplication: a mono-dimensional and observable
instrument – the policy rate. This simplication relied on two assumptions.
First, what mattered were prices and interest rates and not the underlying
monetary aggregates or liquidity. Second, well-functioning nancial markets
would transmit the monetary stimulus across the economy. So, all one needed
to do was to move the policy rate and the entire economy would adjust
accordingly. This also meant that the separation from the scal authorities
could be strengthened through explicit limits on central bank action, such as
no monetary nancing of the decit.
To summarise, the pre-crisis consensus framework allowed transparency,
accountability and limits on central bank actions. This led to the delegation
of monetary policy, which became the primary macroeconomic countercyclical
lever, to a politically acceptable non-elected agency. This was the foundation
of the operational independence of central banks.
4 Barro, R.J. and Gordon, D.B. (1983), “A Positive Theory of Monetary Policy in a National-Rate Model”, Journal of
Political Economy 91(4): 589–650.
5 Blanchard, O. and Gali, J. (2007), “Real Wage Rigidities and the New Keynesian Model”, Journal of Money, Credit and
Banking 39(S1): 35–65.
6 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
In contrast, scal policy had a much more limited role from the cyclical point
of view. This was very dierent from earlier decades in which scal policy
was the centre of macroeconomic policy (for instance, as Governor Jazbec
mentioned, in the wake of the Great Depression).
There were several reasons for this limited role of scal policy. First, there
was widespread scepticism about the eects of scal policy, mostly based on
Ricardian equivalence arguments. This was combined with a sense that the
leads and lags associated with the eects of changes in the scal stance were too
long and poorly understood for scal policy to be an eective countercyclical
tool. Second, since monetary policy could maintain a small and stable output
gap, there was little reason to use another instrument. Third, in several
countries, the priority was to stabilise and possibly decrease typically high
levels of debt. Finally, scal policy was seen as highly exposed to risks of
political interference.
Overall, at least until the global nancial crisis, this macroeconomic policy
setup was seen as a highly successful model. It was often credited for the Great
Moderation and explains the prevalence of ination-targeting frameworks
across advanced economies and, increasingly, in emerging market countries.
Post-crisis needs led to new (yet old) mandates and new instruments
With the onset of the nancial crisis, this model was challenged. Central banks
had to do things that were very dierent from what they had been doing in the
previous 25 years (but not that dierent when judged with a longer history in
mind). For example, they provided liquidity to a variety of agents – not only
deposit-taking institutions but also other intermediaries, such as money market
funds and insurance companies. They supported liquidity conditions in several
asset markets and re-established and repaired broken arbitrage conditions.
They also bought massive amounts of sovereign bonds.
These actions were necessary. They were justiable both from a global welfare
point of view and under long-term ination targeting (the so-called exible
IT framework), but they were dramatic deviations from what one was used to
seeing central banks do. More generally, the realisation that a low and stable
ination rate was a necessary but not a sucient condition for macroeconomic
stability led to a re-evaluation of the pre-crisis framework.
If central banks at times needed to do things that were much less transparent
and much less measurable than changes in the policy rate, the political-
economy and governance conditions that had allowed for delegation became
Opening remarks
7
subject to discussion as well. This does not mean that we should reconsider
central bank independence, but it explains why central banks have seen an
increase in political pressure in so many countries.
Let me give an example. Think about macroprudential policy. Imagine
that either the central bank or whatever specialised agency in charge of it
decides to tighten loan-to-value ratios because it sees leverage growing and
is concerned about a potential crisis. If no crisis materialises in the following
year, all the critics are going to say: “See, you were paranoid. There were
no reasons to tighten loan-to-value ratios. There is no problem. There is no
nancial instability.” Of course, it may be that the crisis did not materialise
exactly because the central bank or the macroprudential agency acted. But,
the counterfactual is not observable and it is dicult, if not impossible, to
convince critics that a crisis outcome would have been the state of the world
in the case of inaction.
This is very dierent from what happens with ination. In this case, the central
bank could go out and say: “See, the ination rate is at 1.9% and, if we hadn’t
tightened, we would be above target.” This vindicates the tough choice ex ante.
Once we deviate from a simple price stability target, we have much murkier,
less measureable and less observable mandates. Things are much more dicult
to defend and, hence, there are more pressures on the central bank to act one
way or another.
This brings me to my next point: how monetary policy has to act sometimes
in support of the scal position of a country, and how this again may muddy
the mandate. As an example, consider the situation in Italy or Spain in 2009,
2012 and 2014. From the scal sustainability point of view, the fundamentals
of these countries cannot explain the wild swings in sovereign spreads. Instead,
this can be ascribed to something akin to a Diamond–Dybvig-type bank run.
6
There is a liquidity component to stability in countries that are in a certain
range of the debt-to-GDP ratio, and this component needs to be addressed. So,
what is the role of monetary policy in this context? How can the central bank
help in steering markets away from the bad equilibrium towards the good one?
In that context, President Draghi’s “whatever it takes” speech
7
played the role
that deposit insurance plays in banking models. Essentially, Mr. Draghi was
saying that the ECB was going to do whatever was needed in order to keep
the euro together against the liquidity crisis. In doing so, the ECB averted the
liquidity crisis altogether. Of course, it is dicult to distinguish liquidity from
6 Diamond, D.W. and Dybvig, P.H. (1983), “Bank Runs, Deposit Insurance, and Liquidity”, Journal of Political Economy
91(3): 401–419.
7 www.ecb.europa.eu/press/key/date/2012/html/sp120726.en.html.
8 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
solvency. This raises the question of what kind of governance framework one
should have to ensure that the necessary scal incentives are in place, once
the central bank plays the role of liquidity provider of last resort on sovereign
markets.
Finally, I would like to touch very briey on so-called helicopter money. I
completely share Governor Jazbec’s view that the idea of helicopter money
is a valid one in a model where central bank credibility is not under threat.
It removes public debt from the market. Since the debt will never have to
be repaid, it is more eective than other forms of scal nancing under a
Ricardian equivalence framework. However, there is a signicant danger of
throwing the baby out with the bathwater. The baby here is the degree of
central bank credibility that we have achieved over the past 30 years. To a large
extent, this credibility is the result of the governance framework for monetary
policy and central bank independence adopted in the three decades before
the global nancial crisis.
I would argue that central bank credibility has been of paramount importance
even after the crisis. It has been probably the main factor behind the lack of
severe deationary episodes. We have had very low ination, but we have
not seen major deationary episodes after the crisis. Given the magnitude of
economic contraction that we have witnessed in some countries, that is what
I think any economist would have expected to happen. So, the question is
how much would helicopter money buy you relative to a Nash equilibrium
between the central bank and the scal authorities. In that model, the scal
authorities would provide stimulus and the central bank, in its independence,
would decide to set interest rates where it believed they should be, based on
its mandate. This is essentially the current framework in most countries and
is one that is best equipped to preserve central bank credibility. In terms of
eectiveness, the dierence is that hyper-Ricardian consumers would see the
debt held at the central bank in the same fashion as debt held by the private
sector. But we know (for example, from the experience of Japan) that markets
do not look at the two in the same way. So, the benets of helicopter money
are likely to be very small and the potential costs in terms of governance may
be very large.
I wish all of us a wonderful conference.
Panel 1
The coordination of monetary and scal policy –
principles and practical experience
Chair
Nikolay Gueorguiev, Unit Chief, International Monetary Fund
Lead Speaker
Steven Phillips, Advisor, International Monetary Fund
Panellists
Jan Smets, Governor, National Bank of Belgium
Lars Rohde, Governor, Danmarks Nationalbank
Dimitar Bogov, Governor, National Bank of the Republic of Macedonia
Nerses Yeritsyan, Deputy Chairman, Central Bank of Armenia
Summary of Panel 1
Nikolay Gueorguiev
The lead speaker, Steven Phillips, recalled the general evolution of thinking
of policymakers on monetary policy and scal coordination over the past 50-
60 years. During the Bretton Woods exchange rate system, it was generally
accepted that monetary and scal policies would work together, and that scal
policy had an important role to play in stabilising output. The idea of monetary
policy being capable of, and sucient for, handling stabilisation of output as
well as ination came to prominence later in the 1990s and 2000s. This was
combined with the view, held by many, that scal policy eorts should focus on
avoiding excesses and ensuring sustainability – in other words, steering clear
of “scal dominance”. This thinking led to more independence for central
banks and more constraints (e.g., rules) for scal policy. Today, post-global
nancial crisis, monetary policy’s room for manoeuvre and eectiveness are
diminished, while scal policy is constrained by previously introduced scal
rules and by a lack of scal space, real or perceived. This situation has raised
several questions and debates:
10 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
• Should we now be more concerned about risks of scal dominance, or about
insucient scal policy contribution to output and ination stabilisation?
How do we nd the right balance? If the risk of scal dominance is really
a problem, is there a way that we can address it more eciently than with
rules that are overly simplistic?
• With monetary policy engaged to the limit, exchange rate moves may
be large. While the overall net eect of a monetary easing on the output
of a country’s trading partners is likely to be positive, spillovers through
exchange rate channels may cause certain strains. Is this problematic? If
so, is this an argument for also using scal easing, rather than just monetary
easing, when countercyclical policy is needed?
The panellists noted that the EU policy architecture envisaged that monetary
and scal policies would pursue their assigned objectives without explicit
coordination. In the current environment, however, most saw a need for
scal policy coordination between the euro area member states to ensure
that the desirable euro area scal stance is in place. They noted that small
open economies usually followed the monetary policies of their main trading
partners, irrespective of their formal monetary/exchange rate framework;
thus, scal policy was their only instrument for smoothing cyclical uctuations
in output. The panellists emphasised, however, that a strong overall nancial
position of the government was a prerequisite for a countercyclical scal
stance in a downturn, as it allowed scal easing without harming public debt
sustainability and the sovereign’s access to nancing. They also warned of the
risk of using monetary and scal policies in order to avoid necessary policy
adjustments or structural reforms that would raise productivity and growth.
During the subsequent discussion, the audience touched upon several issues:
(i) Can we devise scal instruments that would have the same eect on the
domestic economy as monetary policy easing? (ii) Fiscal policy easing may be
necessary now, but how can we make it sustainable and avoid the issue of scal
dominance returning? (iii) What constraint does high public debt impose on
stabilisation policies? (iv) What is the eciency of monetary policy at present
in terms of monetary transmission? (v) What are the benets and costs of
quantitative easing (QE), including for the nancial sector as low interest rates
adversely aect banks and insurance companies?
Panel 1: The coordination of monetary and scal policy –
principles and practical experience
11
The panellists’ responses included the following:
i. Fiscal discipline strengthens economic condence. Moreover, a rebalancing
of tax away from direct income taxes towards less distortionary taxes can
be benecial for growth and job creation. In addition, targeted long-term
investments in infrastructure nanced by very low interest rates can support
domestic demand and raise productivity.
ii. At present, the search seems to be for mechanisms to commit scal policy
to medium-term solvency while allowing short-term exibility so that it
can also contribute to macroeconomic stabilisation.
iii. High public debt does constrain the ability of scal policy to provide
stimulus, and there is no easy way to reduce debt quickly. In any case,
debt reduction will require a signicant structural reduction of scal
spending, the success of which depends on the population’s willingness
to bear sacrices.
iv. On the eectiveness of monetary policy, the European Central Bank
(ECB) facilitated credit expansion by improving borrowing conditions for
companies and households, which resulted in stronger growth and higher
ination than otherwise.
v. Regarding the impact of QE on nancial stability, low interest rates cause
diculties for banks, insurance companies and pension funds. However,
if monetary policy were to fail to achieve price stability and allow the
economy to go into a prolonged period of deation and stagnation, the
nancial system would suer even more, as long-term yields would remain
low for a very long time.
Presentations by Lead Speaker and panellists
Lead Speaker: Steven Phillips
It is a pleasure to be here today, to engage with this distinguished panel of
policymakers and experts on the topic of rethinking monetary and scal policy
coordination.
Let me start with a quick outline of my remarks. I begin with the idea that
for us to “rethink”, it is useful to rst recall the history of thought and its
inspirations. After reviewing the main thinking of the past 50 years or so, I
will turn to two areas to talk about in more depth. One area is the problem
of conducting monetary policy in a context of concerns about scal policy
12 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
excesses. The second area looks at some open economy aspects of monetary
and scal policy coordination, particularly exchange rate implications. Finally,
I will suggest a few issues that panel members may want to discuss.
To begin a stylised history of thinking on monetary and scal policy roles
and coordination, let us go back to the 1950s and 1960s, when the Bretton
Woods exchange rate system was in place. At that time, it was generally
accepted that both monetary and scal policies were available tools to be put
to work on the goal of stabilising the economy. Why was this accepted? One
reason, perhaps, is that in those days there was not so much concern about
policy excesses or policy mistakes – the skill, benevolence and credibility of
policymakers were taken for granted. In addition, when the Bretton Woods
system of xed exchange rates was serving as a nominal anchor on the price
level, it constrained monetary policy’s room for manoeuvre. So, there was not
a sense that monetary policy was fully capable and unlikely ever to need help
from scal policy. Since both monetary and scal policy tools could inuence
demand, why not use both, in a coordinated manner?
A very dierent thinking had emerged by the 1990s and continued into the
2000s. By then, a combination of factors had led many to favour a specialisation
of monetary and scal policy roles and eorts to separate and also constrain
both policies. One factor was that many more countries had exible exchange
rates following the end of the Bretton Woods system. This made monetary
policy more capable, as it had more freedom. There was a view among many
economists that monetary policy instruments were sucient for demand
management goals, without need for help from a less agile, slow-to-move
scal policy. Also, there was a growing belief in the “divine coincidence” of
output and ination stabilisation goals.
Moreover, there was more concern that monetary and scal policies could go
very wrong, for example, if policymakers yielded to inappropriate pressures.
Most notably for our purposes, there was a fear of scal policy excesses, even
to the point of “scal dominance”. There also was a concern that without clear
policy mandates and accountability, the risks of policy excesses would be high.
Such risks were not just possibilities; they sometimes had materialised. There
were cases where one could look back and say that ination had become high,
and judge that scal policy excess and monetary policy accommodation of
this excess were to blame. However, I should note that not all experiences of
excessive ination can be attributed to slippage in scal discipline.
Three other developments likely contributed to concerns about policy excesses.
First, the expanding size of the public sector in many economies gave rise
to greater potential tensions between decit nancing and price stability.
Panel 1: The coordination of monetary and scal policy –
principles and practical experience
13
Second, the deregulation of domestic nancial systems (the end of the so-
called nancial repression) made it less easy for a government to fund its decit
from the private sector, and correspondingly made nancing from the central
bank more attractive. Third, an opening of the external capital accounts
provided governments with a new source of decit nancing – but not on an
unlimited basis. When a government decit is nanced externally, there is risk
of a sudden stop, and even a reversal, of net external nancing. So, a new
concern was that the new availability of external nancing would facilitate
scal indiscipline for a while only to later end in an external nancing crisis,
a crash in output and perhaps an ination‒depreciation spiral.
Thus, there were plenty of worries, especially about scal policy excesses. The
worries were not only about ination but also about large current account
decits and nancial instability and crises, not to mention crowding-out of
private-sector investment and limiting potential growth. Faced with all these
concerns, one might conclude that the single most important job of scal
policy from a macroeconomic perspective was not to make things right, but
to avoid doing harm.
Such concerns fuelled policy and institutional changes that allowed less
discretion for scal policy, with scal rules and constraints on public debt and
decits, and in some cases limits on direct central bank credit to government.
We also saw important moves to clarify responsibilities and accountability of
central banks, together with more independence for central banks and freedom
to act within their mandate – the so-called constrained discretion of ination
targeting. All these changes seemed logical steps to address the diagnoses that
had motivated them.
But, then came the global nancial crisis. The crisis led to rethinking on many
fronts, including a rethinking of macro policy roles, as it gave rise to some
special circumstances and problems for monetary and scal policy. Monetary
policy found its room for manoeuvre reduced and its eectiveness diminished.
It was hampered by the zero lower bound problem, and by the problem of
damaged balance sheets reducing the transmission of monetary policy. Then
there was a concern that keeping interest rates “low for long”, while it might
have a desirable stimulating eect in the short run, would lead to excessive
risk taking and eventually to a crash and a worse outcome. In addition, for
some countries, deploying their own monetary policy had ceased to be an
option, as they no longer had their own currency or had chosen to adopt a
currency board.
14 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Meanwhile, the potential for scal policy to play a supportive role also
diminished, as it was constrained in many cases by previously established scal
rules and/or by a lack of scal space. By the latter, I mean either policymakers’
own judgement that remaining scal space was negligible, or a judgement by
nancial markets that government debt had become very risky.
Thus, we have had both monetary and scal policy being constrained and,
with their eectiveness diminished, a recovery from the Great Recession that
has been weaker than it would have been otherwise. This raises the question
of whether the constraints on monetary and scal policy in the aftermath
of the global nancial crisis could, and should, be relieved in some way, or
whether that would be too risky.
I want to focus on the question of the role of scal policy when monetary
policy is constrained. In the current context, should we be more worried about
an easing of scal policy causing harm, or should we be more worried about
scal policy not making a greater countercyclical eort?
Many debates about monetary and scal policy coordination and interaction
come down to diering judgements of the seriousness of the risk of scal
dominance or of a sudden loss of condence in public nances. Surely, we
can all agree with the principle that sound, sustainable public nances are
essential – a necessary, though not a sucient, condition for stability and
economic welfare. The problem is that the concepts of public sector solvency,
sound nances and scal space are dicult to pin down in operational terms.
We know that there must exist limits on scal decit nancing, but we do not
know the precise limits. So, it is a matter of judging the distribution of risks
and how close we are to a danger zone.
At times, nancial markets seem to clarify the matter for us by stopping
nancing the decit or nancing it only at very high interest rates. However, we
cannot count on markets to give us an early warning or to provide disciplinary
pressure. Too often, it seems that markets do not provide pressure and then
suddenly provide too much pressure, in a panic that is self-fullling. Considering
that markets are prone to sudden switches, one may argue that a government
should be extra careful to ensure it will not lose the condence of markets.
But, how careful? One may also argue that during a panic, central banks
should step in and support government debt, though some will worry that this
undermines incentives for scal discipline. Similarly, regarding quantitative
monetary easing that involves the purchase of government debt, even if that
policy is chosen by an independent central bank and is motivated only by
Panel 1: The coordination of monetary and scal policy –
principles and practical experience
15
its pursuit of its ination target, such purchases have the appearance of the
central bank doing a favour for the government. To some, this brings the risk
that such generosity undermines incentives for scal discipline.
As I have emphasised, the diculty is that reasonable people can come to very
dierent operational judgements on how policies should proceed because the
true distribution of policy risks is not known, and we perceive risks dierently.
In that light, we must ask what more could be done to make the picture
of scal solvency clear, and thus to avoid sudden deteriorations in market
perceptions and jumps in the risk premium on public debt. We have to think
hard about possible commitment devices that would credibly ensure the state
of future public nances without excessively constraining scal policy in special
circumstances.
Perhaps we can nd ways to appropriately constrain monetary and scal
policies, but at the same time let them have the room to ease at the right time
without their action being misunderstood and triggering an unnecessary loss
of condence. That doesn’t mean abandoning scal rules, but it may mean
making them more complex – letting them give exceptions, say, when ination
is very much below target, when there is deation, when there is a sizeable
negative output gap or when the forecast from an independent, credible
central bank is for a persistent negative output gap and deation. Of course,
more complex scal rules could open up new areas for scepticism about their
application (think, for example, of disagreements about the output gap and
rate of growth of potential output).
Let me touch briey on two exchange rate aspects of monetary‒scal policy
coordination and easing that are especially relevant now. One is that with
diminished transmission of monetary policy through domestic channels, an
absence of stimulating help from scal policy means more monetary easing,
a lower interest rate for a longer period of time, and so a larger eect on the
exchange rate. Such currency eects are a normal part of how monetary
policy works, but there is a question of how far they should go. Taking an
international perspective, a policy mix in one country that leads to more
currency depreciation than would some alternative mix may be a sensitive
issue if it diverts demand from other countries that may also have negative
output gaps. A similar sensitive issue arises when, in the pursuit of easing,
monetary policy takes the form of a central bank purchasing the debt of
another country’s government. This can be perceived as a form of foreign
exchange market intervention, as it has a larger exchange rate eect than other
forms of monetary easing. Again, if scal policy stimulus is not available, we
will see greater monetary easing eort and large exchange rate eects. That
16 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
may be an acceptable outcome (particularly if other economies are able to
use their own monetary policy to oset spillover eects), or it may lead us to
reconsider the constraints we have chosen to place on scal easing.
In closing, I admit that I have raised many questions without providing concrete
answers. Let me suggest several questions that the panellists might wish to take
up. First, do we agree that concerns over scal dominance and credibility of
public nances are a key issue in monetary‒scal policy coordination debates?
If such concerns are not overstated, are there ways that we could address
them more eciently than under current rules? Second, do we think that
monetary policy spillovers to the exchange rate are very problematic? If so,
is this a reason to use scal policy easing more to take some of the burden o
monetary policy? Finally, on a subject I did not touch on – namely, the stability
of an economy’s nancial system – do the lessons from the global nancial
crisis have implications for monetary‒scal policy coordination?
Panellist 1: Jan Smets
I am honoured to participate in this seminar and want to thank the Bank
of Slovenia, the International Monetary Fund and, in particular, Governor
Jazbec for having invited me.
When preparing my remarks, I also strolled through the literature on monetary
and scal coordination, focusing on what it has to say about coordination in a
monetary union. In contrast to Steven Phillips, I only went back as far as 1999
where a paper by Chris Sims, the 2011 Nobel Laureate in Economics, drew
my attention.
1
Back then, Sims was already agging the institutional gaps in
the design of EMU threatening the union’s long-term success. The title of the
paper is telling: “The precarious scal foundations of EMU”.
Sims derived his insights from a theoretical framework
2
which explicitly
incorporates monetary–scal interactions. This framework deviated from
the economic paradigm of the 1990s, which prescribed a strict separation
between scal and monetary policy. This was prompted by the belief that the
1 Sims, C.A. (1999), “The Precarious Fiscal Foundations of EMU”, De Economist 147(4): 415-436.
2 This unconventional perspective is labelled “the scal theory (or more descriptively, the real theory) of the price
level”. This theory grew out of the following work: Leeper, E.M. (1991), “Equilibria under ‘Active’ and ‘Passive’
Monetary and Fiscal Policies”, Journal of Monetary Economics 27(1), 129-147; Sims, C.A. (1994), “A Simple Model for
Study of the Determination of the Price Level and the Interaction of Monetary and Fiscal Policy”, Economic Theory
4(3): 381 399; Woodford, M. (1995), “Price-Level Determinacy without Control of a Monetary Aggregate”, Carnegie
Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy 43: 1-46; and Cochrane, J.H. (1998), “A Frictionless View of U.S. Ination”,
NBER Macroeconomics Annual 13: 323-384.
Panel 1: The coordination of monetary and scal policy –
principles and practical experience
17
main interaction between the two policy domains was in the form of attempts
by the scal authority to get the central bank to nance government debt. A
belief that is still widely present today, but that needs nuancing.
This conventional view inspired the institutional set-up of the euro area
whereby an independent central bank at the union level focuses primarily
on price stability for the area as a whole, while national scal policies ensure
sound public nances in each country. Each authority alone should take care
of its assigned objective, without relying on or needing a helping hand from
the other. In order to constrain scal free-riding incentives that arise in a
monetary union, disciplining scal rules were even put into law. They entail
the prohibition of monetary nancing of public debt, a no-bailout clause and
decit and debt rules.
3
EMU architects thus put everything to work to ensure
a maximum degree of monetary dominance.
During the pre-crisis period, the Eurosystem indeed delivered on its price
stability mandate. In contrast, national compliance with the Stability and
Growth Pact rules was far from perfect. Nevertheless, this did not appear to
have impacted the Eurosystem’s stabilisation role.
The crisis altered this view. Not only did it teach us that strict compliance
with rules is necessary, but also that for policies to be eective, they require
an appropriate response from other policies, especially in exceptional
circumstances. We need to let policies have the room to do the right thing at
the right time for the right reason. This may be even more true for countries in
a monetary union. In what follows, I will illustrate two areas where the original
design of EMU limited the synergies between policies, making members more
vulnerable to adverse shocks.
First, euro area countries eectively issue real instead of nominal debt, making
them more susceptible to shocks which can have feedbacks on monetary policy.
Indeed, governments no longer issue debt in their own currency but in euros,
over which they have no direct control. Consequently, in the absence of an
ination cushion, the only option available to resolve unsustainable debt is
outright default. Possibly based on the strong principles enshrined in the Treaty,
markets assumed the Eurosystem had no role to play in sovereign insolvency
and was expected not to act as lender of last resort in the government bond
market – a function that a central bank in a stand-alone country implicitly does
assume. This made countries, possibly even those with sound public nances,
prone to self-fullling market expectations that threatened to turn a sovereign
liquidity crisis into a solvency crisis.
3 See Articles 123, 125 and 126(2) to (14) of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union; the latter also
reinforced by the Stability and Growth Pact.
18 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Figure 1: Government bond yields and spreads versus the German bund
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The euro sovereign debt crisis has taught us this the painful way. Fiscal
fundamentals for the union as a whole were certainly no worse than those
for other major advanced economies, but its borrowing costs were clearly
higher as self-fullling market panic was allowed to gain footing. True, debt
sustainability concerns were justied for some members, but certainly not for
all those under pressure. In 2012, with the Outright Monetary Transactions
Panel 1: The coordination of monetary and scal policy –
principles and practical experience
19
(OMT), the Eurosystem provided a backstop for government funding, breaking
down the vicious circle between market expectations and government debt
dynamics.
Let me be clear: OMT is not enough. Safeguarding long-run solvency requires
decisive action by governments. In general, and as already accounted for in
the original EMU design, a governance framework that ensures sound scal
policies is needed. I therefore count on the reformed Stability and Growth
Pact to deliver better results than its predecessor.
Let me now turn to a second fragility of the original design of EMU, namely,
the lack of coordination among scal policies of individual member states
and its repercussions for the conduct of monetary policy.
During and in the aftermath of the sovereign debt turmoil, several euro area
countries were forced to quickly undertake scal consolidation which was not
compensated by scal loosening in other countries, making the area-wide scal
stance weigh on domestic demand. Since the strengthened scal governance
framework places a dominant emphasis on individual countries’ scal discipline
rather than on area-wide business cycle stabilisation, this left monetary policy
as the key player for macroeconomic stabilisation, requiring the Eurosystem
to resort to hitherto unseen stimulus measures. That may be one reason why
the recovery has been lacklustre so far. Hence the observation, in line with
that of Steven Phillips, that scal policy probably has a bigger role to play in
stabilisation than was originally acknowledged by the Stability and Growth
Pact.
However, one should not be too pessimistic in this regard, because the scal
rules do allow for some support to aggregate demand. First, when interest rates
fall, governments’ interest expenses fall as well, implying that there is more
room for scal expansion before the headline decit limit is crossed. Indeed,
the framework uses headline balances and not primary balances. Second, on top
of that, the scal requirements are formulated in structural terms, implying
that the economic cycle is taken into account and less scal eort is required
during recessions.
Moreover, some improvements to the framework have been introduced and are
to be welcomed. In 2015, by introducing its famous “matrix”, the European
Commission allowed for more exibility in the rules, leaving more leeway for
scal policy regarding stabilisation. With this increased exibility, we should
now of course guard against the risk that those who cannot aord spend it,
while those who can aord it do not. The “cannot” group is large and not
only limited to countries that have been severely aected by the crisis. A case
in point is Belgium, where high legacy debt leaves no room for embarking
20 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
upon scal stimulus. Instead, intelligent adjustment towards its medium-term
budgetary objective is required and aimed for. This again highlights the careful
balance between stabilisation and debt sustainability that scal authorities
need to strike.
This brings me to a more specic, yet related aspect of the current framework
that can be improved: its narrow focus on national scal stances, leaving the
aggregate scal stance for the euro area undetermined. To improve welfare
for the union as a whole, it seems preferable that not only monetary but also
aggregate scal policy be determined at the euro area level. Especially when
monetary policy is constrained, there appears to be a premium in coordination
and better balanced scal actions.
Figure 2: Structural scal balances and medium-term objectives (% of GDP)
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improvement shown over the period 2010-2015. Greece and Cyprus were not included as the
former is still subject to an adjustment programme and the latter has only recently exited it.
MTOs as dened in the Assessment of the 2016 Stability Programmes for the period 2017-2019.
Source: European Commission.
One should not be too pessimistic in this regard either, as here also we see new
initiatives that I applaud. By coordinating national scal councils, the newly
created European Fiscal Board
4
is taking a rst step towards tackling this issue.
4 The European Fiscal Board was established in October 2015, in line with recommendations in the Five Presidents’
Report, and became operational in October 2016.
Panel 1: The coordination of monetary and scal policy –
principles and practical experience
21
To conclude, I would like to underscore that we have to look beyond the
negative consequences of monetary–scal interactions emphasised by the
conventional macro view, and acknowledge the positive spillovers that both
policy domains could have on each other. Both could enable each other to
better realise their specic objective, especially when one policy is constrained.
Fortunately, institutional gaps in the euro area are beginning to be addressed,
acknowledging the subtle interactions between monetary and scal policy and
hence allowing for a more optimal policy mix in which monetary dominance
remains key.
Panellist 2: Lars Rohde
Denmark is the odd case out because of the xed exchange rate regime that
it followed. Let me elaborate on this.
Monetary and scal policy in Denmark
Since the early 1980s, Denmark has conducted a xed exchange rate policy,
rst against the Deutsche mark and since 1999 against the euro (Figure 1, top
panel). Over time, linking the Danish krone to the euro created a basis for
achieving the same level of ination and ination expectations in Denmark
as in the euro area. If ination is higher in Denmark than in the euro area,
Denmark’s competitiveness will, all other things being equal, deteriorate.
This is well understood by both labour unions and employers’ associations. The
xed exchange rate policy has therefore helped to achieve wage agreements
that have supported Denmark’s competitiveness.
As the exchange rate is xed, large current account imbalances are corrected
by the relative wage growth in Denmark and abroad. The present large Danish
current account surplus gives room for larger wage increases in Denmark
relative to abroad.
The xed exchange rate policy implies a clear distribution of responsibilities
between monetary and scal policies. Monetary and exchange rate policies are
aimed at keeping the krone stable vis-à-vis the euro (Figure 1, bottom panel),
while any specic need to stabilise cyclical uctuations in Denmark is handled
via scal policy or other economic policies.
22 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Figure 1: Denmark: Exchange rate and policy interest rate
Danish kroner vis-a-vis euro
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Panel 1: The coordination of monetary and scal policy –
principles and practical experience
23
Fiscal policy has to be disciplined and sustainable
Going into an economic downturn, the initial position of the public budget
has to be so strong that, inter alia, the automatic stabilisers can take full eect
without jeopardising long-run sustainability. This is a precondition for scal
policy to be able to stabilise cyclical uctuations. Furthermore, it is crucial that
nancial markets have condence in scal policy. Hence, in Denmark it is very
important that scal policy is both disciplined and sustainable.
Denmark has strong public nances (Figure 2) achieved through, inter alia,
a budget law and medium-term scal plans. The xed exchange rate policy
has probably helped in achieving this, as politicians cannot rely on monetary
policy to correct lax scal policy.
Figure 2: Denmark: Fiscal balance and public debt
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An independent monetary policy is not a necessary condition for
achieving stability
When comparing Denmark with euro area countries or countries similar to
Denmark outside the euro area (such as Sweden), there is nothing indicating
that the Danish economy has performed worse with respect to the stability of
output and ination (Figure 3). This is in part because the Danish business cycle
is to a large extent synchronous with that of the euro area. Furthermore, scal
policy in Denmark reacts quickly to shocks through large automatic stabilisers.
24 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Figure 3: Output gap and ination in Denmark and Sweden
Output gap in Denmark and Sweden
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So, an independent monetary policy is not a necessary condition for achieving
stability. However, it is required that other policies – i.e., scal – are disciplined
and sustainable.
Panel 1: The coordination of monetary and scal policy –
principles and practical experience
25
The loss of exibility in a xed exchange rate regime is probably
minor for small open economies
Advanced small open economies such as Denmark and Sweden are strongly
inuenced by the world economy, especially the euro area. Studies, such as
those from the Bank for International Settlements, have shown that the policy
rates of small open economies follow those of the euro area and the United
States more closely than can be explained by output gaps and ination (i.e.,
the Taylor rule) (Figure 4). One reason could be that large currency shocks
can create nancial stability issues, for example if a country has large liabilities
in a foreign currency that are not hedged.
So, in practice, for small open economies “ination targeting” and “xed
exchange rate policy” lead to very similar monetary policy. Consequently, the
loss of monetary policy exibility in a xed exchange rate regime is probably
small – or at least smaller than is predicted by textbook theoretical models.
Figure 4: Monetary policy rates in selected small advanced open economies
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#(
Note: Euro Area: main renancing operations rate; Switzerland: three-month LIBOR target
range; Sweden: repo rate; Denmark: lending rate.
Source: Macrobond.
26 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Panellist 3: Dimitar Bogov
Macedonia, similarly to Denmark, has its exchange rate pegged to the euro,
having previously been pegged to the Deutsche mark. The country has pursued
this policy from 1995 onwards, and since a one-o devaluation in 1997, the
exchange rate has been stable. Of course, we have been challenged several
times, but successfully overcame these challenges. I like what Lars Rohde
said, as it is in line with the view that I very often express in Macedonia: for
small open economies, it doesn’t matter whether the monetary framework
is ination targeting or an exchange rate peg. In the end, you have to have
the same prudent policies. Otherwise, although the transmission channels
may be dierent, the outcome will always be the same. If you have upward
pressures on the foreign exchange market, eventually you will end up with
higher interest rates – regardless of whether you achieve this through exchange
rate depreciation or through interest rate increases to defend the exchange
rate. Maybe the large economies have a choice, but small economies do not
have much freedom in choosing the right monetary policy.
What is the experience of Macedonia regarding the coordination of monetary
and scal policies? An exchange rate peg means having a constraint on
monetary policy. In the case of Macedonia, it is not a full constraint because
the “impossible trinity” is not present, since we do not have capital mobility for
various reasons. One reason is that the capital account still has some restrictions;
but more importantly, in my opinion, it is the general political instability of
the country which is not very favourable to capital inows. Constraints to
capital inows enable some degree of independence to monetary policy in a
xed exchange rate regime. Anyway, it is scal policy that should take on the
burden of adjustment when one has an exchange rate peg. This means that
scal policy must be disciplined. When we analyse the 19 years from 1994
to 2012, we nd that in half of these years scal policy was countercyclical,
while in the other half it was procyclical. When we look at dominance, whether
scal or monetary, we nd that in and around the years Macedonia suered
shocks – 2001, when we had an internal security crisis; and 2008, when the
global nancial crisis started – we had scal dominance. Otherwise, scal policy
was quite disciplined, especially in the period before 2001. Maybe it helped
that Macedonia always had some arrangements with the IMF, and that the
exchange rate peg pushed scal policy to be very disciplined. Before 2001,
scal policy was subordinated to monetary policy, supporting the stability of
the peg. In 2001, this was disturbed as other priorities emerged. After scal
stabilisation in 2003, however, coordination of monetary and scal policy
was restored and scal policy supported the exchange rate peg and monetary
Panel 1: The coordination of monetary and scal policy –
principles and practical experience
27
policy. It should be noted that before 2008, scal decits in Macedonia were
very small – the country’s budgets were always either balanced or had a decit
of no more than 1% of GDP.
Before 2008, when the economy was booming, the government made two
decisions – one favourable and one not so. The rst decision was to reduce the
tax burden, with corporate tax and income tax rates reduced substantially to
10%. Social contributions (the tax wedge) were also reduced. This appeared
to be very benecial after the crisis. The unfavourable development was that
the windfall in the budget at that time tempted the government into spending
more on higher public sector salaries, more generous pensions, increased social
welfare and higher subsidies for farmers. At that time, this did not place a
burden on the budget because it was in surplus. However, after 2008–2009
when there was a sharp deceleration in capital ows and foreign trade and GDP
also declined, a shortfall in the budget emerged. Fortunately, scal policy did
not reverse the action on taxes, and this proved to be supportive for businesses
and the economy after 2009. There also was room for scal stimulus in 2009.
Because budget decits had historically been low, public debt was extremely
low (at around 23% of GDP), creating the space for scal stimulus. Hence,
scal policy supported economic growth in Macedonia after the onset of the
global nancial crisis in 2008. However, scal stimulus worsened the public
nances, and public debt rose very quickly to the current level of 45% of
GDP – public debt has thus doubled in seven years.
Monetary policy had to take the opposite stance: it had to tighten. First,
because in 2009 Macedonia had to defend its exchange rate through very high
interest rates. Once the situation stabilised and as economic growth picked
up and the external balance was restored, monetary policy was loosened. It
remained in this loosening cycle until early May 2016. Why was this possible?
Because there were structural changes in the economy and the balance-of-
payment position improved substantially thanks to policies aimed at attracting
foreign direct investment. The policy rate of the central bank was reduced
to an historically low level of 3.25%. At that time, many asked why the rate
could not be lowered to 0%, as the ECB had done. We could go close to zero
if scal policy were more balanced, but in a context in which scal decits
since 2008 had been between 3% and 4%, monetary policy had to keep the
balances in the economy. So 3.25% is Macedonia’s “zero lower bound”. We
have to have this spread vis-à-vis the ECB’s policy rate in order to preserve
the exchange rate peg.
28 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
The lesson from this is that when you have disciplined scal policy and there
is scal space, scal policy can support the economy when it is faced with a
shock without endangering monetary policy. Monetary policy could tighten if
necessary, but not by much. If the scal space were exhausted, however, then
support from scal policy would be very dicult. Now we are wondering what
will happen if Macedonia is hit by another shock. Fiscal policy has no room
for expansion – our debt level is over 45%, and our limit is obviously much
lower than that of the euro area countries.
Panellist 4: Nerses Yeritsyan
The objective of monetary and scal policies is to achieve stable/sustainable
and non-inationary economic growth. I agree with the lead speaker, Steven
Phillips, that the dominant issue in monetary–scal coordination is gauging and
managing the risk of scal indiscipline, especially when the objectives of scal
policy become solving problems of unsustainable budget decits and debt.
The ultimate objective of both policies is to maximise the overall welfare of
society, which can be achieved by keeping ination low and employment at
its potential level. Economic theory suggests that these two objectives are not
mutually exclusive. Thus, strict adherence to “separation of powers” in the
management of the economy will cause degeneration in the economy as scal
and monetary authorities genuinely and rigorously pursue their own selsh
objectives. This may result in serious economic distortions even if accidentally,
or randomly, scal and monetary authorities are achieving or are close to
achieving their objectives.
It is true that in the last couple of decades, countries have built up space for
countercyclical monetary and scal policies by following prudent scal and
debt sustainability policies. This space is quickly disappearing, however, and
should be reassessed and not used to postpone necessary adjustment and
structural reforms in the economy. Fiscal space should not be used to nance
growing pension bills instead of implementing pension reforms, and monetary
space should not be used for keeping interest rates too low for too long in order
to rescue a dead or non-competitive private sector. History has shown how
costly these delays can become.
Fiscal policy is a stricter constraint on monetary policy due to its lower agility.
However, in the current globalised world with a growing number of open
economies, monetary policy is also constrained by exchange rate and capital
account volatility. The latter should also become a constraint for scal policy in
open economies, especially when the fear of oating is not overcome. For much
Panel 1: The coordination of monetary and scal policy –
principles and practical experience
29
of the past three decades, scal policy remained a major concern for monetary
policy in emerging market economies. Unsustainable scal decits and public
debt levels created the prospect of scal dominance in many countries, leading
to high and volatile ination, a fear of oating and elevated risk premia on
government debt. Unfavourable exchange rate dynamics – linked to weak scal
and monetary policy credibility, low levels of nancial development and a high
degree of dollarisation – exposed emerging market economies to destabilising
capital ows and high exchange rate pass-through. The consequence was that
both scal and monetary policies tended to be procyclical in many countries,
accentuating rather than dampening economic volatility.
The relationship between scal policy and interest rates is another aspect of
scal and monetary policy interaction. The impact of scal policy on interest
rates depends on whether the private sector is Ricardian or non-Ricardian. In
a Ricardian world, scal decits and debt have no consequences for interest
rates, as the private sector saves the full extent of discounted tax liability
implied by an increase in the scal decit. In a non-Ricardian world, however,
changes in scal decits can lead to changes in interest rates. The classical
mechanism is the “crowding-out” hypothesis, where higher scal decits, with
an unchanged money supply, lead to higher interest rates. In economies with
scal dominance and a reliance on foreign credit, the mechanism that prevails
is worsening default risk premia on government debt. If debt levels are too
high, a country may nd itself in a sudden stop or constrained in adopting
expansionary policies, as it may experience higher sovereign risk premia and
volatility in its costs of nancing.
This increase in risk premia and volatility in the exchange rate create nancial
stability issues. In this case, monetary policy should deal with scal as well as
nancial-sector dominance as policy constraints. The lesson learned from the
recent crisis is that central banks may serve as a rst line of defence – including
providing initial liquidity or rescue packages to banks – but experience has
shown that if this is instead of countercyclical scal policies, it only delays the
crisis and eventually scal policy should deal with consequences in more severe
way. We have done a simulation analysis for small open and fragile economies
which shows that some degree of temporary exchange rate management
is necessary during economic turbulence driven by external shocks, which
suggests more active scal policy or less scal constraint on monetary policy.
Finally, before I talk about the Armenian experience, one aspect of monetary
and scal interaction that was overlooked and in my opinion should receive
our attention is the local currency government debt market attracting
international capital. In emerging market economies, local government debt
markets are well developed compared to other local nancial markets, but
30 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
they are underdeveloped compared to advanced economies. Governments
have become complacent in addressing this issue as access to foreign currency
debt becomes easier. Therefore, the target should be not only nancing the
decit, but also developing a domestic savings pool as well as the appropriate
infrastructure for attracting foreign saving into local currency instruments. In
this case, scal and monetary authorities in open market economies will have
more space to counteract sudden shocks. I hope at some point somebody will
propose a multicurrency global trading platform with a centralised clearing
and settlement system.
In Armenia, scal rules and formal coordination procedures between the
government and the central bank play an important role. The Central Bank of
Armenia (CBA) implemented an ination-targeting policy framework in 2006
(with a target of 4 ± 1.5%), which has developed over time with help from the
IMF and colleagues from the Czech National Bank. The current government
debt level is moderate and there is no direct central bank nancing, indicating
the absence of scal dominance in the usual sense. A debt-to-GDP ceiling of
50% of the previous year’s GDP has been ocially set as a scal rule under
the Law of the Republic of Armenia on the Budgetary System, and this is
well implemented. The rule has survived two major shocks in the past decade.
Monetary and scal policy coordination takes place on institutional, operational
and debt-management levels. The CBA acts as a scal and payment agent
of the government, in accordance with a series of formal agreements and
government decisions. Relations between the CBA – as a nancial agent of
the government – and the Ministry of Finance are not regulated under a single
formal agreement but rather in separate agreements dealing with specic
issues. Furthermore, additional guidelines have been issued separately, for both
the CBA and Ministry of Finance sta, on how to implement the agreements
in each institution.
Monetary policy operations are formally separated from debt-management
transactions. The CBA has full independence in implementing its monetary
policy and does not interfere in the issuance program of government securities.
If not satised, the CBA has the right and power to issue its own securities. The
cash ow forecasts produced by the Public Debt Management Department
are currently shared with the CBA on a weekly basis, which helps to manage
day-to-day liquidity eectively.
The CBA also provides an ocial opinion on the main government programmes
– such as the strategic development programme, the medium-term expenditure
programme, the annual budget law and the debt-management programme
Panel 1: The coordination of monetary and scal policy –
principles and practical experience
31
– and on tax and expenditure polices. The CBA is required to provide an
independent opinion on the state budget-related hearings in the Parliament,
which is discussed during the presentation of the annual state budget law.
Formal coordination and information-sharing between the CBA and the MoF
take place throughout the year. There are eight meetings per year for interest-
rate setting, where monetary policy is discussed and where the Ministry of
Finance is represented by the Deputy Minister as an observer. There are also
weekly meetings attended by both institutions: on Thursdays at the Ministry
of Finance to monitor budget execution and cash forecasts, and on Fridays
at the CBA for monetary policy coordination. Furthermore, there are daily
phone conversations between CBA and Ministry of Finance sta and daily
informal meetings take place at the CBA during which participants discuss
relevant issues of the day.
Overall, this policy coordination framework has served Armenia well, especially
during the recent global and regional crises. After the recent oil crisis, Armenia
emerged with the lowest ination (negative), the highest growth (3.5%) and
most stable currency exchange rate (14% adjustment). The nancial sector
also showed great resilience and built up its capital buers, driven by the CBA’s
decision at the end of 2014 to increase the minimum capital requirement from
5 billion drams to 30 billion drams (US$60 million).
In conclusion, coordination between monetary and scal policies remains a
major policy goal and neither of these policies should have dominance over
the other. A temporary departure from this rule might be necessary, but only
to counteract temporary shocks and support reform-driven structural change
processes. With the current dual objective of both monetary and nancial
stability, scal policy becomes an even more important constraint for monetary
policy and, if ignored, it could lead to a hard landing with a larger cost
to taxpayers. In this context, deepening and globalising local currency debt
markets would improve policy coordination and allow more space for eective
and harmless countercyclical policies.
General discussion
Nikolay Gueorguiev: Let me pose a question to the panellists before we take
some questions from the audience. Monetary policy in Europe, the United
States and elsewhere has already done a lot to stabilise output and keep
ination on target. However, senior policymakers everywhere have repeatedly
warned that success in this endeavour to stabilise output and ination requires
support from other policies as well. So, in the panellists’ view, what role should
32 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
scal policy in the EU play in light of its own constraints? More generally,
what is the best feasible monetary‒scal policy mix in the EU in the current
circumstances? I am pleased that we have diverse representation on the panel
from countries in the euro area, in the EU and outside the EU. Sometimes,
an outside view can also be very helpful.
Jan Smets: It is a very good question. I would say three things.
First, I think that monetary policy should do what it ought to do. In the euro
area, we have a clear price-stability mandate entailing medium-term ination
of close to but below 2%. We should do whatever is necessary to meet this
mandate, independent of what is happening elsewhere. In the current situation,
it is really important to continue to achieve the ination objective as it would
enhance the eciency of our monetary policy. Given the zero lower bound,
it would facilitate the rebalancing of competitive positions within the euro
area and it would help bring down debt positions that are still very high in
some segments of the euro area economy. Indeed, the current close to zero
or even negative ination rates in the member countries contribute to rising
debt positions in real terms, which weighs on the recovery. So, in order to exit
from this very problematic situation we should do our job and we are doing it.
What we are not doing though, is favours for the government – quantitative
easing (QE) is not a sign of scal dominance. On the contrary, it is a reection
of our independence. It is a demonstration that we are in full control of our
actions. Once policy interest rates approached their eective lower bound, we
decided on QE measures because we considered them absolutely necessary.
However, I recognise that, given the incomplete nature of the economic and
monetary union, the asset purchase programme was designed such that it takes
into account the need for protection of the ECB and the need to keep scal
incentives in place. I am referring to the limited loss sharing, to the allocation of
the programme across countries according to the ECB’s capital key, and so on.
Second, it is clear that the eciency of monetary policy will be strongly
enhanced if other policies were to help. When I was a student, my professor
used to say – and students present here perhaps have already heard the same
saying – that monetary policy can lead a horse to water but cannot make
it drink. With our monetary policy measures, we are doing just that: giving
incentives to the private sector to consume and invest. However, in order
to make the corporate sector invest, you need returns on capital and banks
that are sound. You need a stable framework in scal terms and renewed
structural policies that enhance economic and job growth. That is the task
for governments. That is why the president of the ECB is calling on others
to do their duties.
Panel 1: The coordination of monetary and scal policy –
principles and practical experience
33
Third, I have two messages on the interaction between monetary and scal
policy. First, in normal times, at the national level, countries have to stick
to the Stability and Growth Pact. This would give scal policy the room to
stabilise the economy in bad times. Indeed, the recovery in euro area member
states would have been smoother if scal policies had more room to actively
contribute to it. In this way, both monetary and scal policy would stimulate
the economy. Unfortunately, only a few countries in the euro area currently
possess this margin for manoeuvre. In my own country, Belgium, the margin
is not there: we still have a public debt of 106% of GDP. Hence, in order
for scal policy to regain its stabilisation function and to restore condence,
adherence to the scal rules is crucial. You cannot convince people to invest
when Ricardian equivalence is playing, when people fear higher taxes in
the future to repay public debt you are incurring today. So, the rst job is
to comply with the Stability and Growth Pact rules. The second job, as I
already mentioned earlier during my presentation, entails completing the EMU
framework. Besides monitoring and correcting national scal stances, we also
need to pay more attention to how these add up to the scal stance of the
euro area as a whole. Better coordination of national scal policies would
result in a more appropriate scal stance for the union. In turn, this would
facilitate the exchange of views on the best combination of the monetary and
the scal stance for the euro area as a whole. For this to be possible, however,
you ultimately need greater scal responsibility at the union level.
Lars Rohde: I think it is a very dicult question. I am not sure I am in a
position to give good advice on that. One has to recognise that there are
boundaries for the impact of monetary policy. To echo what Governor Smets
said a couple of minutes ago, I think it is very dicult for monetary policy in
its own right to get the ination rate up. Why? Because, it is well recognised
that ination, at the end of the day, is a question about conditions in the labour
market and the existence of idle capacity. So, how should we have ination
going forward? In my opinion, we should again echo that monetary policy is
not the only game in town. If the starting point is a huge negative gap in the
economy, then we should rely on other instruments (i.e., structural instruments)
and also consider a balanced path where, for some period of time, you have
a more relaxed scal policy but where you have a credible strategy for how to
balance the economy in ve years or ten years’ time. In other words, having
a trade-o, or whatever you wish to call it, between demand now and a more
restrained public sector demand in the future. I think moving in that direction
could, to some extent, contribute to solving the problem.
Nikolay Gueorguiev: How does this issue look from outside the European
Union?
34 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Dimitar Bogov: Usually, in Macedonia, we are in the opposite situation. We
are receiving recommendations and criticism from the EU. Speaking as an
outsider, the key here is that currently the EU is in a situation where monetary
policy is the only game in town. There is a huge burden on the ECB. The ECB
is pumping a lot of money through QE, but the monetary policy stimulus is
not giving results easily and so fast. Both the money multiplier and velocity
of money have fallen. Because of that, a strong response is necessary from
the ECB.
But, why did the EU come into such a situation? The main problem is that
during the peak of the cycle, before 2008, many of the countries ran budget
decits. In such a cyclical phase, when there were windfalls of revenues and
high economic growth, it would have been wise to have had budget surpluses.
But most countries did not; they had procyclical policies and increased spending
during the expansionary phase. Thus, there was little room for countercyclical
policy during the downturn. However, the key is to restore scal discipline and
solid public nance management rules. Then the question is why they did
not have this before? The simple answer is that there were some scal rules
but they were simply not respected, as in the cases of Greece, Germany and
France. Rules are being strengthened once again, and the important question
is if they will be obeyed in the future.
Nerses Yeritsyan: I will be more critical in the sense that monetary easing
most probably was delayed and is now is aiming at the wrong target. Because
of this, scal and structural problems have become more severe. There is
a lot of discussion on this, but action-wise there is no progress. In our kind
of economies, we would be dead already because of scal and monetary
constraints and non-availability of external saving to nance our problems,
whereas the rest of the world is saving to nance the problems of advanced
countries, thereby delaying the adjustment process. This is a privilege, but if it
is used for a long period of time there might be reversals and the consequences
will become more severe.
On monetary policy independence, I want to react to Jan Smet’s comment
that QE shows that the ECB is independent. I would argue that if you follow
independent policy, you will not be able to impose discipline on scal policy
and structural reforms – for example, by increasing the haircut on collateral for
repo-eligible government bonds or increasing haircuts for dierent government
instruments. In this way, you would be able to impose scal discipline which
would increase interest rates. Interest rates would not be negative if you did
not collect collateral at 100% or with a 1% or 0% haircut for the collateral.
For example, in the Armenian case, when we became independent from the
Panel 1: The coordination of monetary and scal policy –
principles and practical experience
35
Soviet regime, the government could easily borrow directly from Gosbank, the
state bank, without limit. The nance minister would write a cheque and the
credit would go to dierent sectors. When we took over the central bank, the
rst thing we did was to get a law in place that forbade direct lending to the
government. In addition, we securitised the stock of government debt to the
central bank. The government then had to use those securities to raise money
for the budget decit in the private market. Interest rates went up to 100% or
200%. In the European context, the obvious early examples are Finland and
Sweden. These are very good examples of how adjustment should take place.
If it is delayed, then something else should be done and more vigorously than
it has been done so far. That would be my reection.
Nikolay Gueorguiev: Now is the time to take a few questions from the
audience for the panellists.
Suzanne Bishopric (Global Sovereign Advisors): My question is for Lars
Rohde on pensions. I am wondering how much negative and falling interest
rates are contributing to the scal problem by making the pension funds more
underfunded, because those liabilities just balloon when interest rates drop.
Isabel Correia (Bank of Portugal): We have to take the “rethinking” topic
of this conference seriously. I believe we would not be hearing about the issue
if the zero lower bound had not materialised after the crisis. Everyone was
quite happy about the way monetary policy had been working for 15 years
prior to the crisis. It was very much driven by having one instrument and one
goal, and this created independence and credibility that were very dicult to
distinguish. We should understand that when we came from the old type of
monetary policy to that instrumented in interest rates, we are really playing
the game of changing incentives for the agents in the economy. This is the
main channel of transmission. So, when you try to compare it to scal policy,
for me it is always a bit weird that we focus so much on the stimulus decit
part of the scal counterpart. What we know in terms of research is that we
have instruments in scal policy that are very similar to the interest rate. But,
these instruments are not government expenditure (G) or decit or debt. If I
used G or decit or debt, I would not have an independent central bank. For
me, I believe that we cannot really rethink the connection between scal and
monetary policy if we do not take seriously where scal policy is playing a very
similar role to the interest rate and begin to think about taxes. As someone
has already pointed out, we have to go inside the decit and understand what
type of institutions we would have to have so that we can have scal roles
similar to the monetary ones, but without the bound that monetary ones
36 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
have in a way that when you arrive at this situation, they really can play as
substitutes to monetary policy without having anything to do with decit or
debt or scal space.
Mejra Festić (Bank of Slovenia): The Great Depression between 1929 and
1936 had very similar reasons to those we faced during the last crisis in 2008,
but it was manifested on a more sophisticated level. We know that prior to the
crash in 1929, there was a high overheating of the economy and exponential
stock market growth. During the depression, there was a liquidity trap and we
know that the Keynesian approach changed the economic trend. My personal
opinion is that scal policy easing would be the rational option, but the question
is to what extent would its combination with monetary policy be sustainable.
(Unidentied): I have two simple questions. In most countries, we are playing
with high levels of government debt. First, what constraints do these high
levels of debt impose on interest policy of central banks? Second, is there
any prospect of ever getting away from these high levels of government debt?
Andrzej Raczko (National Bank of Poland): Today, Governor Jazbec
mentioned that monetary policy should not be the only game in town. I
think you have in mind the euro area. I would like to ask my colleagues about
the eciency of monetary policy, taking into account the current situation of
having very low ination for only one year and very weak economic growth
for a longer period in the euro area and the whole EU. Of course, we have
a very easy monetary policy. However, if we consider the impact of the very
easy monetary policy of the ECB via the banking sector, which is experiencing
signicant problems, the credit channel is less eective than before. The
exchange rate channel of transmission also is not as eective as before. If
monetary policy is easy and is the only measure that is being implemented, it
raises questions about the cost of this policy. It is well known that the cost is
the stability of the nancial sector. I am thinking not only about the insurance
companies – for whom the negative spillover eect of low interest is obvious –
and about the pension fund system, but also about the stability of the banking
sector. Maybe we should consider having a tight monetary policy stance, given
that the monetary policy of the ECB now is less eective than before and that
the long-term environment of low interest rates may be very dangerous for
the stability of the nancial sector.
Nikolay Gueorguiev: Let me briey summarise the questions from the
audience for our panellists.
The rst question is on the eect of negative interest rates on pensions and
insurance companies. The second question is whether we can devise scal
institutions and revenue-neutral tax rebalancing that would have the same
Panel 1: The coordination of monetary and scal policy –
principles and practical experience
37
eect on the domestic economy as monetary policy easing, now that the zero
lower bound is upon us. The third question is that scal policy easing maybe
rational now, but how do we make it sustainable and how do we avoid the issue
of scal dominance returning? The fourth question is on the constraints that
high public debt imposes on monetary policy and how can debt be reduced.
The last question is on what we think about the eciency of monetary policy
now in terms of benets versus costs, the nancial sector costs and other
possible costs. How should policymakers take this into consideration?
Lars Rohde: I could start with the relatively simple question. It was the
question about insurance companies and the impact of very low interest rates.
I think it goes wider than just the impact on insurance companies. Because, if
you are going from a high- to a low-return environment, it is simply a transfer
from creditors to debtors. It also means that if you have to have a certain
income stream in 20 or 30 years from now, you have to save more, not less, if
the interest rate is lower. This is a relevant point if we are discussing QE. If QE
is forcing down interest rates, it also means that people will have to save more
not less, and thereby reduce the overall demand in the economy. So, there is
the redistribution eect and the solvency eect for insurance companies unless
they are hedged. Maybe we have made some regulatory failures. Perhaps we
should have changed the regime so that insurance companies and pensions
funds were forced only to deliver hedgeable products and have a regulatory
environment where also liabilities were marked to market. Then, we would
not have the solvency issue at least.
Jan Smets: Regarding the question on how we can make public nances
sustainable, I think the answer is twofold: you need scal discipline and strong
growth. Certainly, both could be enhanced in the euro area. Fiscal discipline
should inspire condence in the sustainability of public debt, which would in
turn stimulate consumption and investment by the private sector. In addition,
structural reforms as well as a stronger banking system should spur economic
growth. In Belgium, we are now engaged in a huge tax-shift operation which
is benecial to growth and jobs and is helping to make the ECB’s monetary
policy more eective.
Second, regarding the eciency of monetary policy, I believe it is most certainly
having an eect. The ECB’s measures have improved credit conditions,
enhanced credit expansion and lowered borrowing rates for companies and
households, and they are supporting growth and ination. This is indeed
dicult to prove as there is no counterfactual, but the ECB’s analysis is
supportive of this.
38 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Third, what about the impact of monetary policy on nancial stability? There
certainly can be adverse spillovers on pensions and on the protability of
insurance companies and banks. But in the rst instance, achieving price
stability – which is what monetary policy measures are aiming at – is also
benecial for nancial stability. If monetary policy failed to achieve price
stability and allowed the economy to go into a prolonged period of stagnation,
that would be bad news for the nancial system. It would mean that long-term
yields would remain low for a very long time. The imbalance between savings
and investment within Europe and in the euro area is the ultimate reason why
interest rates go down; monetary policy can be seen as accompanying that
movement. This may raise nancial risks, but these should in the rst instance
be addressed by micro- and macroprudential policies. Monetary policy, which
is set for the whole euro area, cannot be geared to address problems which are
very specic to some segments or regions of the euro area. For that you need
targeted nancial stability instruments, which fortunately have been elaborated
since the crisis. We are indeed counting on them a lot.
Dimitar Bogov: I would only like to touch on the Keynesian approach.
There is one big dierence between the 1930s and now: government budget
expenditure then accounted for 20% of GDP or less, compared to 50% of
GDP now. So, there is much less space for Keynesian stimulus after the crisis
of 2008. Here we come to the issue of reducing the public debt. This is likely
to be very dicult. We will likely live in periods of high public debt which
will constrain scal policy in the future. What could be the exit solution here?
Maybe a huge reduction in the role of the state, like what happened in the
1990s in transition economies. There is a need for structural changes in the
participation of the state. Here the main question is the reduction of the tax
burden instead of scal stimulus, which could have a similar impact at the
end, but in the longer term and structurally it would be much more benecial.
Nerses Yeritsyan: I would like to add that if Keynes were alive today, he
would be surprised at the current level of the wealth of nations and at how
eective public institutions are. That is really impressive. Going forward,
the main issue is how much sacrice we are ready to make to make things
sustainable, because the threat of adjustment is following us. It is an attitude
issue whether we want to face this adjustment problem or delay it with the
hope that growth will come from somewhere or people will want to work
longer hours. This is not going to happen because the rhetoric in politics
is the opposite: people want more pensions and higher indexation of their
wages and want to work fewer hours. This is the dilemma we have to solve in
the European context. This is important for us because as a young nation, we
want to learn by doing the right things going forward and our neighbourhood
Panel 1: The coordination of monetary and scal policy –
principles and practical experience
39
environment is important from that perspective. I would like to stress again
the point that I mentioned earlier: the interest rate would likely be positive
and signicant if the ECB did not support government bonds as collateral
for its operations. That would be a solution. Also, a 20% or 30% haircut on
those securities would solve the problem. You would see positive interest rates
immediately. This may be very revolutionary, but this sacrice is better than
sacricing wealth. We would be poorer than we are today and the adjustment
would be easier afterwards. Now, policies and institutions have kept wealth at
a level that people have not felt the cost of crisis and the social fabric has not
changed too much. However, sustaining the social fabric requires more rigorous
eort in structural reforms if we want to escape the new adjustment causes.
Lars Rohde: A couple of words about the Keynesian situation in the 1930s.
It is interesting to note that Belgium has just raised 100-year money in capital
markets at 2%, and Ireland did the same. In Germany and Denmark, the
government can raise money for 30 years at well below 1%. One idea that
one could come up with is somehow to have targeted long-term investments in
infrastructure nanced at a very low interest rate. That would be a Keynesian-
like way out of the crisis. The second point I would like to make is about
strong nancial institutions. In broad terms, in Europe we have been too slow
and too soft on our nancing institutions for too long. They should have been
recapitalised in a much more radical way back in 2008-2009. The ECB has
done a great job, but it would also have been helpful if the national regulators
had been a little bit more strict earlier on.
Nikolay Gueorguiev: Let me briey summarise the discussion.
First, the thinking of policymakers about monetary policy and scal policy
coordination has evolved during the past 50-60 years from the acceptance that
both instruments can and should be actively deployed to stabilise output and
ination in a discretionary way. That acceptance was the case in the 1950s
and 1960s. The idea of monetary policy being more capable of and sucient
for handling both tasks – namely, ination and output stabilisation – and of
the need for scal policy to be constrained to prevent excesses came into
prominence in the 1990s and 2000s.
Second, currently in many countries monetary policy eectiveness is diminished
and scal policy is constrained by rules or by the sheer lack of scal space.
The search at present seems to be for mechanisms to commit scal policy to
medium-term solvency while allowing short-term exibility so that it can also
contribute to macroeconomic stabilisation.
40 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Third, monetary policy has done a lot already to help stabilisation, but this
has great spillovers to exchange rate and nancial stability. The spillovers in
the nancial sector can be handled through prudential policies. There is a
need in the EU to improve scal policy coordination between member states
and the centre, and the EU needs to think about the EU-wide scal stance.
We need to be mindful that in small economies – in all countries, actually
– scal policy at times can be procyclical and scal dominance can occur at
least some of the time.
In small open economies, monetary policy is constrained no matter what
the monetary regime is. This comes from the open capital account and large
amount of capital ows. In this situation, a disciplined scal policy is needed
to have space to stabilise output when needed.
The last observation: scal policy should not be misused to delay structural
reforms of unsustainable policies. Let me thank the panellists and the lead
speaker for their contributions and close the session.
Panel 2
Fiscal policy implementation in the EU institutional
framework and implications for monetary policy
Chair
Erik Jones, Professor, The Johns Hopkins University
Lead Speaker
Ľudovít Ódor, Deputy of the Network of EU Independent Fiscal Institutions
Panellists
Lucio R. Pench, Director, Directorate-General for Economic and Fiscal Aairs,
European Commission
Dušan Mramor, Minister of Finance, Slovenia
Agnès Bénassy-Quéré, Professor, Centre d’Economie de la Sorbonne
Javier J. Perez, Head of Conjunctional Analysis Division, Directorate General of
Economics, Statistics and Research, Bank of Spain
Cláudia Rodriguez Braz, Chairman of the Working Group on Public Finance,
ESCB and Banco de Portugal
Summary of Panel 2
Erik Jones
The discussion in this panel revolved around six themes: (i) monetary and scal
policy; (ii) rules and discretion; (iii) complexity and simplicity; (iv) centralisation
and coordination; (v) unity and diversity; and (vi) macroeconomics and nance.
The rst three themes relate to the institutional framework that exists in Europe.
That framework is designed to achieve sustainability rather than stabilisation.
The goal is two-fold: to ensure that no member state runs excessive decits or
builds up excessive debts, and to avoid any interference from scal policy in the
conduct of monetary policy. The implications are often procyclical. Under the
current framework, scal authorities are encouraged to tighten as economic
performance slows and to loosen as output growth accelerates. This can be
seen clearly in the context of the recent sovereign debt crisis. Fiscal policy was
42 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
contractionary as the crisis deepened and then became expansionary once the
ECB stepped in to underpin sovereign debt markets in July 2012. This pattern
is not salutary for European economic performance. Monetary policy is set to
achieve price stability and scal policy accommodates. As a result, monetary
authorities moved too late (and did too little) to avert a recession in Europe or
even to mitigate the consequences adequately.
A part of the diculty results from the reliance on policy rules. Such rules are
eective in addressing familiar problems. They are less eective in addressing
problems that are unfamiliar. As a result, a number of member states faced
unexpected complications. A few even confronted problems with debt
sustainability. The policy response has been to proliferate new rules within
the existing institutional framework. These rules address special conditions
or economic circumstances. They also create incentives for member states
to engage in structural reforms. The result has been to create multiple and
overlapping policy frameworks. Inadvertently, this has created greater scope
for discretion – by oering an implicit choice over which framework should
be applied and when. In turn, this discretion has given rise to uncertainty.
Looking back at the actions of key institutions in response to deviation from
the rules by the member states, it is almost impossible to anticipate ex ante
which framework would be applied.
The rules have also become more complex. The intention was to stretch
the policy framework to address both sustainability and stabilisation at the
same time. This intention was not without merit, but it gave rise to signicant
unintended consequences. Many of the policy rules now rest on sophisticated
measures of economic performance that are also unstable over time. The
output gap is a good illustration. This measure is important for calculating
the structural budget. It builds on a mixture of real-time estimates and near-
term forecasts. The methods used to make these calculations are inherently
inaccurate. By implication, the revisions that are made over the passage of time,
and as increasingly precise historical data can be brought into the calculations,
are often many magnitudes larger than the policy target. For example, it is
impossible to reduce the structural budget decit in real time by 0.1% of
gross domestic product (GDP) when revisions to the estimated output gap
can be 15 times that amount or even larger. Accounting rules create another
source of distortion. The rules exist to strengthen the comparability of scal
accounts across countries. The unintended consequence is to change the way
national governments interpret revenues and expenditures. For example, public
investment must be treated as a current outlay even if the bulk of the nancing
comes from the private sector.
Panel 2: Fiscal policy implementation in the EU institutional framework
and implications for monetary policy
43
The implications of this complexity are not the same for all member states.
Large member states with advanced economies and relatively smooth
investment cycles are less aected, while smaller member states with rapidly
developing economies and more uneven investment cycles are disadvantaged.
These smaller countries not only face irrational policy requirements (because
the targets are so unstable) but also tend to underinvest (because of how
investment is treated by the accounting rules). These smaller countries are
also less likely to benet from any discretion applied in the choice of policy
frameworks and they are more likely to suer from the procyclical, price-
stability-oriented monetary and scal policy mix.
This diagnosis of the current situation raises questions regarding how the
macroeconomic policy environment could be improved. This is where the next
three themes – themes (iv) to (vi) referred to at the outset – become important.
The rst consideration is whether Europe should continue to rely on scal
policy coordination or whether it requires centralised scal institutions to
balance the requirements for sustainability and stabilisation. The advantage of
such institutions is that they could allow for increased market discipline to fall
on sub-centralised scal units. If Europe had a single scal authority, it could
enforce the “no bailout” rule more consistently. This is what many believe to
be the main lesson from the United States. There, most state governments have
“balanced budget” amendments or some other kind of binding scal policy
requirement. Where these are not followed, market discipline is allowed to
function. Meanwhile, the US federal government provides for macroeconomic
stabilisation through a mix of automatic stabilisers and discretionary scal
policy.
There are two problems with this line of argument. The rst is that US scal
institutions do not work as eectively as is imagined – either in terms of
disciplining sub-national governments or in providing for stabilisation. There
are elements that Europe could borrow from the US experience. The usefulness
of supplementary federal unemployment benets that kick in for a limited
period when sub-national (or state) governments experience a profound
economic shock is one example; federal deposit insurance is another. European
policymakers could create similar arrangements that would backstop member-
state economic performance without creating unnecessary moral hazard.
Nevertheless, the willingness of the member states to construct institutions for
scal centralisation is limited. This is the second problem with the argument
for centralisation. Member state governments prefer scal sovereignty to scal
solidarity. Hence, they prefer also to retain an institutional framework based on
coordination rather than aggregating scal institutions at the European level.
44 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
The present arrangements for scal policy coordination are too complicated.
The challenge is to make the rules simpler. The question is whether the same
rules should apply to all member states. There is a political logic to equal
treatment. In practice, dierent member states are treated dierently. The
“no bailout” rule is a good illustration. Although theoretically this rule applies
to all member states, in practice smaller member states face discipline while
larger member states get more leniency (in the sense that they are “too big
to fail”). Moreover, this pattern is borne out in virtually every federal scal
arrangement and not just in Europe. The rules for scal targeting should
also dier depending upon the country. This creates space for much more
diversity and, hence, member state sovereignty. The challenge is to build
political support for such an arrangement. At the moment, that support does
not exist in Germany, among other countries.
Perhaps, though, it is enough to settle for a more modest change to the current
institutional framework. The completion of a European banking union could
be sucient to prevent a crisis such as the last one from recurring. Such
a project would not improve the macroeconomic framework directly, but it
would insulate macroeconomic policymakers from shocks emanating from the
nancial sector. It would also provide the cross-border risk-sharing mechanisms
in the form of deposit insurance and resolution funding necessary to prevent
governments from having to absorb responsibility for excessive private-sector
liabilities that suddenly become unsustainable public-sector debt. Such an
arrangement would not be wholly separate from the scal framework; both
deposit insurance and resolution funding require some kind of scal backstop.
Nevertheless, this level of centralisation should not impinge unnecessarily on
member state scal sovereignty and it should not complicate the interaction
between monetary and scal policy.
A banking union would be a step in the right direction. By itself, however, it
would be insucient. Europe must continue to make progress on achieving
a capital markets union in order to diversify bank funding and deepen the
channels for cross-border private-sector risk sharing. European nancial
markets also require some kind of common risk-free asset. Such arrangements
will not only strengthen the institutional framework for macroeconomic policy
coordination but also widen the scope for monetary policy, which has been
overextended in attempting to respond to the crisis.
Panel 2: Fiscal policy implementation in the EU institutional framework
and implications for monetary policy
45
Presentations by Lead Speaker and Panellists
Lead Speaker: Ľudovít Ódor
First of all, I would like to thank the Bank of Slovenia for inviting me to this
conference. A few years ago, Mervyn King said that central bankers are more
obsessed with scal policy than with ination. If he is right, I am denitely in
the right place. Today, I am going to make the following very simple point:
in order to have a functional monetary union with no overburdening of
monetary policy, the euro area needs a more decentralised and depoliticised
scal framework.
Sustainability and stabilisation
Let me start with the basic scal objectives. A proper scal framework should
ensure long-term sustainability while avoiding procyclical scal behaviour.
The framework in the euro area failed on both fronts. In good times, just
before the crisis hit, it did not motivate the creation of sucient scal space;
in bad times, it was too restrictive to stabilise the economy. In the middle of
the sovereign debt crisis, when market pressures heightened, the policy debate
turned into austerity mode, and more and more new scal rules were legislated.
The mood changed only after the ECB promised to do “whatever it takes” to
save the euro. But again, the pendulum has swung too far. We are now in a
“who can introduce more exibility?” phase, ignoring potential sustainability
risks lurking on the horizon. In my view, this schizophrenic, Dr. Jekyll and Mr.
Hyde behaviour is a direct consequence of the faulty institutional set-up and
represents a real threat to the conduct and independence of monetary policy.
The partially nished house
There has been a lot of debate about the potential causes of the euro area
sovereign debt crisis. Among them, shortcomings in the original institutional
design have played a prominent role. The Five Presidents’ Report recognises
that the EMU is “like a house that was built over decades but only partially
nished”.
1
In my opinion, in the area of macroeconomic management there
are four very important fault lines that should be addressed in order to increase
the resilience of the single currency.
First, there are blurred responsibilities between national and EU level policies.
When accountabilities are not separated clearly, the political ght is often
between national interests and those of Brussels. As a consequence, voters
1 Juncker, J.C. in close cooperation with Tusk, D., Dijsselbloem, J., Draghi, M. and Schulz, M. (2015), The Five Presidents’
Report: Completing Europe’s Economic and Monetary Union, Brussels: European Commission.
46 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
frequently see this political debate as a zero-sum game. Europe should focus
more on common interests, risk-sharing mechanisms and insurance schemes,
and not on ne-tuning inherently national policies. In order to nd “European”
values for the citizens, the subsidiarity principle has to be respected.
Second, peer pressure to achieve common macroeconomic and structural
objectives has failed. With bailout mechanisms in place, member states have
no real incentives to pursue sound policies if the most negative assessment
they can get is “limited compliance”. Ministers will not be keen to punish
their colleagues if their policies will be under investigation the next time.
Moreover, the European Commission also has become more political (more or
less openly), under the heavy inuence of the most important member states.
Without de-politicisation of policy evaluation in the euro area, procyclical
behaviour will be hard to eliminate.
Third, management of the sovereign debt crisis by European leaders is a
textbook example of how not to address dicult macroeconomic and nancial
problems. The “too little too late” behaviour actually forced the ECB to become
a substitute for scal discipline, with all the potential moral hazard problems.
Overburdening monetary policy is a real threat, which also raises important
questions about central bank independence. True, it was partially also the
ECB’s fault, since its monetary policy actions were not aggressive enough in
the rst phase of the crisis. The reduction of interest rates and quantitative
easing came much later in the euro area than in the United States.
Fourth, the slow decision-making process in general in the euro area is a clear
disadvantage in an increasingly globalised world, where quick actions are
necessary in many cases to cope with macroeconomic shocks. Therefore, a more
exible policy framework is needed in order to remain globally competitive.
In sum, the euro area needs a much better economic policy framework, with
well-functioning sticks and carrots for member states, less political inuence
and more exible community-level decision-making. The question is how to
achieve these goals?
Romanticism versus realism
Economists have somewhat dierent views on how the optimal medicine should
look like. Some would agree that a fully-edged scal union (something like
the United States of Europe) would, at least in theory, go a long way towards
solving most of the problems. In the current political environment, however,
only a small minority of member states would be willing to transfer more
sovereignty to Brussels. If the rst-best solution is unattainable, is the euro
project doomed to failure or are there other options to ensure scal discipline?
Panel 2: Fiscal policy implementation in the EU institutional framework
and implications for monetary policy
47
Charles Wyplosz has argued that the scal policy problem in the euro area
can be solved without further integration.
2
In his view, compulsory adoption
of eective scal discipline frameworks by member countries should replace
the several times discredited Stability and Growth Pact. At the national level,
these frameworks should combine intelligent scal rules and independent
scal councils adept at combining rules and discretion. At the collective
level, the implementation of national frameworks should be monitored by
an independent European scal council vested with the power to bring cases
to the European Court of Justice. The “no bailout” clause should also be
restored to eliminate moral hazard. In addition, Wyplosz argues that legacy
debts should be signicantly reduced in order to allow countries to pursue
counter-cyclical scal policies.
Michael Bordo and Harold James agree that the euro area is still a long way
from a new political equilibrium that shifts towards greater scal federalism.
3
In contrast to the minimalistic approach advocated by Wyplosz, Bordo and
James propose a series of measures which amount to “partial scalisation”.
Their rationale is quite simple, and is based on the historical analogy between
the United States and the EU: in order to achieve further integration, voters
should rst see the value added of a common action. Europe should focus on
win-win situations which would increase cross-border ties and thus represent
a “strong cement to the union”. These partial scalisations might come in
the form of reaping eciency gains from a collective action or as insurance
mechanisms at the EU level. Bordo and James provide a number of examples,
among which the most prominent are the banking union, the capital markets
union, common social security, an energy union and a common defence policy.
Both realistic solutions require important modications to the institutional
set-up.
Depoliticisation and decentralisation
At the heart of the sovereign debt crisis in Europe lies the fundamental
contradiction between bailouts and scal sovereignty inside a monetary union.
One cannot have both at the same time. With the benet of hindsight, it is
clear that absent resolution mechanisms and strong links between bank and
sovereign risks were the main factors behind the bailouts in the initial phase
of the crisis. Since then, major progress has been made to set up resolution
schemes and to present a roadmap towards a banking (nancial) union. These
2 Wyplosz, C. (2017), “Fiscal Discipline in a Monetary Union Without Fiscal Union”, in: L’. Ódor (ed.), Rethinking Fiscal
Policy after the Crisis, New York: Cambridge University Press.
3 Bordo, M. and James, H. (2017), “Partial Fiscalization: Some Historical Lessons on Europe’s Unnished Business”,
in: Ľ. Ódor (ed.), Rethinking Fiscal Policy after the Crisis, New York: Cambridge University Press.
48 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
are absolutely necessary building blocks of any successful currency union.
Creditors and shareholders have to bear a large part of the losses stemming
from insolvency of banks or even sovereigns.
Important lessons can be learned from the functioning of existing federations.
The degree of central control varies considerably within them. One extreme
possibility is reliance purely on market discipline – i.e., having a credible “no
bailout” policy (as in the United States). The other extreme is full solidarity
between member states, when bailout is widely expected. It should be noted
that the design of area-wide scal rules is heavily dependent on the approach
chosen. In the former case, almost no monitoring by the centre is necessary,
while if one chooses the latter approach, very detailed rules and coordinated
scal policy are unavoidable to ght moral hazard.
The current situation in the euro area is somewhere between these two
extremes. Europe is balancing between the low credibility of the “no bailout”
clause in the Treaty and the need to avoid free-riding. Irrespective of the
nal model chosen, a fundamental redenition of accountability between the
centre and national authorities would be necessary in any case. In my view,
Europe needs a decentralised and depoliticised scal framework to ensure
scal discipline in the long run.
Maze or pyramid?
Several considerations have to be taken into account when reforming the
scal framework in Europe. First, in my view, it is necessary to better align
theory and the actual design of scal rules and institutions. The fundamental
conict between using the one-size-ts-all approach and at the same taking
into account country specicities has often led to reliance on escape clauses,
special regimes and “other factors”. As a result, Europe has ended up with a
complex web of sometimes contradictory rules and procedures.
4
Paradoxically,
the system relies on so many rules that the nal verdict is in fact a discretionary
decision by the European Commission/Council in many cases. Despite the
large number of rules, the decisions are still very hard to predict.
Second, the division of labour between the community and national level
is blurred. There is no clear separation of accountability and responsibility.
The European framework combines a non-credible “no bailout” principle,
sovereignty of member states in budgetary issues, the Stability and Growth
Pact, and funds such as the European Stability Mechanism (ESM) or European
4 See Ódor, Ľ. (2014), “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly: Lessons from the rst phase of implementation of the new
European scal framework”, Council for Budget Responsibility Discussion Paper 3/2014, Bratislava (available at
http://www.rozpoctovarada.sk/download2/gbu_nal.pdf).
Panel 2: Fiscal policy implementation in the EU institutional framework
and implications for monetary policy
49
Financial Stability Facility (EFSF). It is necessary to dene when and under
what conditions intervention from the centre is warranted. Moreover, current
discussions about a stronger scal union might add another layer of challenges,
namely, the question of the proper design of scal rules and institutions at
the community level. It is also important to limit political inuence over the
application of rules and procedures as much as possible.
Third, current scal indicators allow scal gimmickry, and real-time evaluation
of structural budget balances is more art than science. More appropriate
methodological tools are available in the literature, but their application is
often hampered by the current institutional set-up.
A solution to these three fundamental problems I propose with Gábor Kiss
is similar to the arrangement advocated by Wren-Lewis.
5
The rst line of
defence against irresponsible scal policy behaviour should be at the local
level, using home-grown scal rules and independent scal institutions. The
community level in our proposal is represented not only by the European
Commission, but also by an independent scal watchdog for the euro area.
6
These institutions should, in our view, focus primarily on avoiding free-riding
and procyclicality at the level of the whole area and on managing countries
breaching European limits.
A decentralised scal framework is also more compatible with the current
situation in the EU, where not all member states have introduced the single
currency. For member countries outside the euro area, it would be hard to
accept more central budgetary oversight.
As I stated earlier, it is not possible to separate the issue of scal frameworks
from the question of the overall set up of a currency union. Therefore, at
the bottom of Figure 1, I list two important pre-conditions to be met: a fully
functional banking union and a stronger “no bailout” principle. One should,
however, note that strengthening the “no bailout” clause is not possible without
sound macroprudential policies and an eective banking union. Even if it
is unlikely to achieve full credibility of the “no bailout” principle, as is the
case in the United States (at least in the medium term), the greater the losses
absorbed by shareholders and creditors, the easier the design of scal rules
at the community level.
5 Ódor, Ľ. and Kiss, G.P. (2017), “Lost in Complexity: Towards a decentralised scal framework in Europe”, in Ľ.
Ódor (ed.), Rethinking Fiscal Policy after the Crisis, New York: Cambridge University Press; Wren-Lewis, S. (2003),
“Changing the Rules: Why we should not accede to EMU´s current scal regime”, New Economy 10(2): 73–78.
6 It should be noted that there are important dierences between the European Fiscal Watchdog (EFW) in our
framework and the European Fiscal Board (EFB), which was set up later.
50 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Figure 1: Proposal for a new European scal framework
EFW
European fiscal rules
Minimum standards
Local fiscal councils
Local fiscal rules
Better indicators
Banking union
Ex ante sovereign resolution schemes
Separation of accountabilities
The problem of decit bias in currency unions arises both at the local level
and the level of the whole area. In my view, the obvious approach would
be to build a hierarchical system of responsibilities. When there is no sign
of free-riding behaviour with potential contagion eects, the national level
should be responsible for ghting against the local decit bias. In that case,
a country-specic, tailor-made solution that is more in line with theory and
based on better scal indicators should be designed.
Area-level rules and institutions should primarily focus on problems concerning
common interest. High on this list are possible contagion, free-riding behaviour
or, for example, counter-cyclical aggregate scal policy. In the case of a fully
credible “no bailout” clause, centrally imposed scal rules on member states
are not even necessary. If the euro area is successful in putting in place clear
rules for burden sharing, banking union and debt restructuring with a strong
backstop mechanism, the current trend for legislating more and more complex
scal rules can be reversed. In my view, it would then be sucient to operate
with one or two simple rules. These rules should not target yearly balances in
national budgets. Instead, they should ght against the decit bias occurring
at the euro area level. One can imagine various possibilities suitable for this
purpose: debt levels, sustainability indicators or, for example, sovereign risk
indicators. It is important, however, to design rules not with target levels,
but rather with maximum values tolerated by the community (one common
threshold). Countries operating below these thresholds would be free to conduct
Panel 2: Fiscal policy implementation in the EU institutional framework
and implications for monetary policy
51
their scal policy if they respect minimum benchmarks (the universal 3% decit
limit can be abolished). If the limits are breached, however, oversight from
the centre should step in. The sovereignty principle should be signicantly
reduced when the agreed limits are exceeded.
Figure 2: Separation of scal responsibilities in the euro area
Euro area fiscal
watchdog
Country IFI
Country-level fiscal rules:
- Domestic deficit bias
- Avoiding procyclicality
at the national level
European rules:
- Limiting free-riding
- Avoiding aggregate procyclicality
- Minimum standards for local
fiscal frameworks
• Simple common limits
(net debt, risk margins, etc.)
• Procedural rules for countries
over limits
• Simple rules for the European
budget
• Requirements for local fiscal
frameworks
• Procedural rules for the budget
cycle
• Full coverage of the
public sector
(stock variables)
• Target debt trajectories
• Operational targets and
instruments
• Cash flow
Ex ante strong resolution mechanisms and banking union
The hardest problem to tackle is avoiding aggregate procyclicality of scal
policy in exceptionally bad times (when monetary policy is constrained by
the zero lower bound). There are two potential solutions: central risk-sharing
mechanisms, or better coordination of scal policies. I am very sceptical of the
latter since it is not trivial to measure and combine country-specic multipliers.
52 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Concluding remarks
Over 25 years ago, the Delors Report
7
stressed the importance of macroeconomic
policy coordination and exible national (structural) policies for a successful
economic union. It also emphasised the key role of the subsidiarity principle.
The questions today are where to draw the line between national and European
policies and how to design the right incentive structures for policymakers.
The pool of potential solutions is limited by the (un)willingness of citizens to
transfer much more power to Brussels. Therefore, as Wyplosz
8
points out, we
have to nd the constrained optimum.
There is a relatively widespread consensus that completing the Single Market
and the banking (nancial market) union are necessary building blocks for a
more stable European currency in the long run. The issues are much more
controversial in case of scal and structural policies. Moreover, monetary
policy is pushed to its limits in order to substitute for the inaction in those two
areas. If a United States of Europe is not on the list of realistic options in the
foreseeable future, the only alternative is to reform the incentive structure for
national policies.
As I have argued, in case of scal discipline, we should move towards a
decentralised and depoliticised framework. This is theoretically more sound
and practically more enforceable than the current web of complicated rules
and procedures. Europe should base its scal framework on synergies between
smart scal rules and independent scal institutions both at the national and
the euro area level.
Issues for discussion
• How can the incentive structure of national policies (scal and structural)
be reformed in order to ease the burden on monetary policy?
• Is it possible to pursue counter-cyclical aggregate scal policy without
central risk-sharing mechanisms?
• What are the options for reducing the complexity of the euro area’s scal
framework? What roles should independent scal institutions play (both
at the national and European level)?
7 Committee for the Study of Economic and Monetary Union (1989), Report on Economic and Monetary Union in the
European Community, Luxembourg: Oce for Ocial Publications of the European Communities.
8 Wyplosz, op. cit.
Panel 2: Fiscal policy implementation in the EU institutional framework
and implications for monetary policy
53
Panellist 1: Lucio R. Pench
Many thanks to the organisers for having invited me. I have three points to
make on:
i. the origins of the EMU scal framework: the Maastricht assignment;
ii. reections on the Great Recession and its aftermath (we may also call it
“the reality check”);
iii. possible ways forward for the EMU scal framework, which were mentioned
by Ľudovít Ódor in his presentation.
We can quickly go over the rst point, the Maastricht assignment, partly
because it is well known and partly because it has been dealt with in some
of the earlier presentations. A characteristic of this unique experiment –
centralised monetary policy in the hands of an independent central bank with
price stability as an objective, and decentralised scal policy in the hands of
sovereign member states subject to supranational rules – is the set of rules that
are supposed to govern the interaction between scal and monetary policies.
A common feature of these rules is that they are proscriptive as opposed to
prescriptive in nature. The Treaty bans excessive government decits and
monetary nancing of government decits and does not allow the bailout of
governments.
What are the conceptual underpinnings of these constructions? I think the
underlying idea is that the supranational monetary policy was in need of
protection from – as opposed to coordination with – scal policy. If you read
the writings of Otmar Issing,
9
it stands out very clearly that the very word
“coordination” was seen with suspicion from the side of the ECB. Why so?
Because it was seen to be possibly protecting from national scal policy aected
by pervasive decit bias. This seemingly peculiar attitude of the ECB had
two conceptual underpinnings: the superiority of monetary policy in dealing
with shocks that macroeconomic policy can address; and the belief that
discretionary scal policy, more often than not, ended up destabilising rather
than stabilising the economy. I would say that the introductory presentation
highlighted that these were very much part of a broader consensus going well
beyond the euro area.
9 See, for example, Issing, O. (2005), “The role of scal and monetary policies in the stabilization of the economic
cycle”, speech at the International Conference on “Stability and Economic Growth: The Role of the Central Bank”,
Mexico City, 14 November (available at www.ecb.europa.eu/press/key/date/2005/html/sp051114.en.html).
54 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Let me now give you some elements of how things have changed.
Figure 1 highlights the euro area scal stance versus the scal rules. The blue
bar represents an admittedly not easy reconstruction of the rules because of
their complexity. This, in essence, is what full compliance with the rule of the
Stability Pact would represent. After 2009, when the rule was suspended, the
recommendation was to do what you are doing, namely, expand. The lighter
blue dot in the gure represents the change in the structural balance that
occurred. The pattern is interesting: almost every year, the scal stance was
less restrictive than full compliance with the Stability and Growth Pact would
imply. This is what the ECB was ocially asking for. An important exception
is 2012, but you cannot blame the scal tightening in that year on the rules
by any stretch of imagination, because the structural balance is much higher
than the scal rule would have implied. In fact, if you use a more sophisticated
assessment, by examining the discretionary scal eort shown by the yellow
dot, you see that the eect was even bigger. We know the reason for this: before
the “whatever it takes” speech by Mario Draghi on 26 July 2012,
10
uncertainty
over what the ECB would do in terms of providing liquidity to member states
in distress was pervasive. Thereafter the pattern changes. If you move to today,
you see that the requirement may have slowed down somewhat, but scal policy
is actually becoming more expansionary rather than restrictive.
Figure 1: Euro area scal stance versus scal rules (% of potential GDP)
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10 www.ecb.europa.eu/press/key/date/2012/html/sp120726.en.html
Panel 2: Fiscal policy implementation in the EU institutional framework
and implications for monetary policy
55
Could one have done better in terms of a rule? I have a nal element in the
rather complicated Figure 1. The green bars are the results that would provide
a rule that is perhaps more economically sophisticated. This rule of thumb
deals with sustainability and stabilisation on an equal footing, whereas the
EU rule put sustainability ahead. That gives somehow dierent results, but
still one may question whether it would give the right policy mix. Why so?
Because we know what is behind it. In Figure 2, euro area monetary policy is
compared with the Taylor rule, which is represented by the two dotted lines
in which the equilibrium interest rate is set either at zero or at the potential
growth rate. Before the crisis, we all thought that the equilibrium interest rate
was 2%. I did not consider this rate here, because it would yield results with
not much sense. In the gure, we see at least two episodes in which the policy
rate is above what would be given by the Taylor rule. In the second episode,
you have the quantitative easing, and that is why you have a long-term interest
rate that gives a better idea of debt than the policy rate.
Figure 2: Euro area monetary stance versus the Taylor rule
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What can we conclude from this? There has been a pendulum pattern. As
Ľudovít Ódor said, it is all procyclicality as before. In this regard, I would like
to make three points. First, full insulation of monetary policy – basically the
old ECB model – is partly responsible for the procyclical excesses of scal
policy. Remember what happened in 2012 and what we have seen. Second,
56 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
the decit bias may not be the sole externality of scal policy that the EMU
scal framework has to protect against. Linked to that is the conclusion that
the scal rule should reect both objectives of sustainability and stabilisation.
But – and this is my nal and a very dicult point – it may not be possible to
encapsulate the right balance in a rule. It is a judgement call that is particularly
dicult when monetary policy is constrained. This is the lesson that I draw
from comparing a more sophisticated rule with the outcome and stance of
monetary policy.
I see two alternative ways forward for the EMU scal framework. I put a
question mark here because I am not sure exactly about the position taken in
Ľudovít Ódor’s presentation. It seems to me that Mr. Odor’s presentation largely
embodies a kind of a return to Maastricht. He recommends decentralised scal
policies, subject to “sustainability benchmarks” and “oversight from the centre”
in case of the agreed limits being exceeded. I have three points: (i) it looks to
me like a bit of a rehashing of the original Maastricht assignment, perhaps
without the Pact but with the rules of the Treaty; (ii) it does not deal with the
(non-theoretical) case of stabilisation decit at the level of the euro area; and
(iii) I do not know whether what Jean-Claude Trichet called “federalism by
exception” is a politically viable option.
I call my alternative “Overcoming Maastricht”. I would suggest that a
centralised stabilisation capacity is needed to meet the challenges highlighted
by the crisis. It should be integrated with stability-oriented national rules and
a credible “no bailout” rule at the EU level. That is my conclusion.
Panellist 2: Dušan Mramor
I would like to give you some insights into how a nance minister lives under
the circumstances of existing EU scal rules. The question is: Is it survivable
or not? The whole idea in the existing EU scal rules is that of counter-cyclical
policy: you save in good times, and you can use that scal space in bad times.
The idea is logical. However, the problem is its implementation. Let me present
to you the example of Slovenia. To comply with EU scal rules, as a nance
minister of Slovenia I have the goal of reducing the structural scal decit by
0.6 percentage points of GDP every year for several years, as we have a very
high nominal budget decit and our medium-term objective is to achieve a
nominal surplus of 0.5% of GDP, as measured by EU accrual accounting
standards ESA 2010. This is determined by the European Commission on
the basis of the current situation and forecasted economic developments in
Slovenia.
Panel 2: Fiscal policy implementation in the EU institutional framework
and implications for monetary policy
57
We have to go through three stages of tricky planning to achieve the structurally
adjusted decit reduction target of 0.6 percentage points of GDP through
adopting appropriate annual budgets. As in most EU countries, budgets in
Slovenia are adopted and carried out on a cash accounting basis. Therefore,
the required level of nominal decit reduction in the cash budget should be
calculated in three stages. In the rst stage, the reduction needed in structural
terms is determined (i.e., 0.6 percentage points of GDP). In the second stage,
the reduction needed in ESA 2010 accrual terms that is consistent with the
structural decit reduction target is calculated. In the third stage, through the
conversion of accrual to cash basis, the actual reduction of the budget decit
needed is found.
The calculation of the structural decit is the rst thing that makes our life
impossible. The structural decit depends on the output gap – its calculation
and its stability over time. In the case of Slovenia, six consecutive estimates
in three years of the output gap for 2015 varied from -2% to -0.4% of GDP;
the estimate of the level of structural decit and its needed reduction is very
much a moving target. Even if the European Commission xes the target
of a 0.6 percentage point reduction in the structural decit, how can we
determine by November each year, when the budgets for the following two
years are prepared, the needed ESA 2010 decit reduction if the output gap
– and hence, the target – moves in this way from November onwards into the
budget year and beyond?
Unfortunately, this is not all. Eurostat constantly changes its interpretation of
ESA 2010 after a budget is adopted, during and after the budget year. This
continuously changes the ESA 2010 budget results and alignment with the
scal rules. One example of how the interpretation can change is the decision
over what is included and what is not included in the public sector. Another
example is how certain special transactions are treated, such as those of the
Slovenian 100% state-owned Bank Asset Management Company (BAMC, or
the so-called bad bank). Hence, the nance minister prepares the budget on
the basis of the prevailing Eurostat interpretation of which institutions are
regarded as the public sector, but Eurostat subsequently makes changes during
the budget year. The same applies for other interpretations. The treatment
of BAMC’s transactions changed three times during the budget year. But,
this is not all. Eurostat changes its interpretations even once the year is over.
These changes were substantial for Slovenia in April of 2016, for example,
with Eurostat stating that they would treat certain transactions from 2015
dierently. Consequently, Slovenia’s ESA 2010 decit for 2015 was revised
upwards by 0.7 percentage points of GDP in April 2016. For comparison,
the corresponding increase for Ireland was 1 percentage point of GDP and
58 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
for Slovakia, where additional institutions were included in the public sector,
it was 0.5 percentage points of GDP. Recall that the European Commission
looked at these gures in April 2016 to determine compliance with scal rules
in the previous year (i.e., 2015).
In order for us to implement scal policy within the European Commission
rules, these April interpretations of Eurostat should be communicated to me
nearly two years earlier, during the budgeting process, and should not change
afterwards. However, as I noted earlier, the required decit reduction turned
out to be an impossible moving target, causing me sleepless nights and putting
pressure on my sta to come up with precise Eurostat interpretations and the
relevant calculations. My sta tried hard to get relevant inputs from Eurostat,
but concluded that what they got made no economic sense. Slovenia’s statistical
oce was also ghting Eurostat. In the end, Eurostat said that if we did not
comply, they would use an interpretation that would result in the budget decit
being not 2.9% of GDP decit, but over 3% of GDP, which would make
Slovenia subject to the excessive decit procedure. We complied.
As already mentioned, the issue of the calculation of the output gap not only
is problematic for a nance minister under the Stability and Growth Pact rules,
but also has important negative consequences for the economic policies of EU
members. I asked my sta to look into the European Commission’s output gap
methodology and to compare the results through the years. They rst focused
on 2007, when Slovenia’s economy was clearly overheated. The European
Commission’s methodology that was used in 2006 to predict the output gap
in 2007 produced the following result: for the overheated Slovenian economy
in 2007, it predicted practically a 0% output gap and, consequently, a 0%
structural decit. In contrast, the result of the calculations for 2017 on the basis
of the European Commission’s methodology is that Slovenia has the highest
positive output gap in the EU, at 6.9% of GDP, thus predicting a seriously
overheated economy. But where is Slovenia really at in terms of overheating?
We have deation, the external current account is in surplus to the tune of
7.3% of GDP, unemployment is much higher than the long-term average, and
domestic demand is weak. In short, no overheating whatsoever. Nevertheless,
the calculations on the basis of the European Commission’s methodology
mean that in these circumstances of a weak economy, we have to reduce our
structural decit by 1 percentage point of GDP, implying a very restrictive scal
policy. In fact, it is even more restrictive than it seems, as a 1 percentage point
reduction in the structural decit converts into a much higher reduction in the
headline ESA 2010 decit. Before Eurostat’s last adjustment, Slovenia achieved
a reduction of 1.2 percentage points of GDP in the headline ESA 2010 decit
in 2015. This was equivalent to only a 0.2 percentage point reduction in the
Panel 2: Fiscal policy implementation in the EU institutional framework
and implications for monetary policy
59
structural decit. Imagine if the same applies to the calculations for 2017. The
requirement of a 1 percentage point reduction in the structural decit could
translate into a reduction of up to 2 percentage points in the headline ESA
2010 decit (potentially even more on a cash ow basis). That would without
doubt completely “kill” the Slovenian economy.
The EU methodology is intuitively quite logical, but it produces completely
illogical results. Thus, when it is claimed that this methodology is “rocket
science”, I say “but for a rocket that does not y”. Unobservable variables,
problematic inputs, a problematic timeframe and fantastic dierences between
results make it ill-suited to the task, and implementing it results in severely
procyclical scal policy that prevents the EU from exiting the crisis.
I also would like to mention Eurostat’s methodology of accrual-based
accounting as one of the negative growth factors. For example, we have the
EU investment programme, the “Juncker Plan”, in which one of the sub-
programmes is energy-saving investments. Let us say that you have government
buildings which are not insulated and do not have the most ecient heating
and cooling systems, and that you bring in private money to invest into
energy-saving investment and investors are paid out of the savings. How is
this accounted for under the EU methodology? Private money that comes
for this investment is treated as public expenditure in the year of investment.
This increases the debt level of the country, so in the end, it is counted as
contributing to the decit. And this is not the only problematic rule. All
investments of the public sector are on an accrual basis of ESA 2010 and are
accounted for as expenditures in the year that the investment is made. In the
private sector, business investment is not expenditure – it is not an item on
the income statement; only depreciation is. If you have a small economy with
investment cycles which are very pronounced and you try to pull out of a crisis
with scal stimulus in the form of accelerated investment, you are unable to
as the rules of the Stability and Growth Pact are breached.
Therefore, we have a big problem with the implementation of the EU’s scal
rules, which are in principle sensible. I pointed this out at the Euro Group
and ECOFIN meetings. To my knowledge, this was the rst time in 15 years
that the European Commission and ECOFIN recognised that there are some
problems with the methodology. Subsequently, Slovenia was not required to
reduce its structural decit next year by 1 percentage point (as calculated using
the methodology), but by only 0.6 percentage points, as it was clear that the
calculation of the Slovenian structural decit for the next year completely
dees economic logic.
60 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Panellist 3: Agnès Bénassy-Quéré
I am going to talk about scal policy and scal policy coordination in the
euro area. In this regard, we have objectives, instruments and institutions (see
Figure 1).
Figure 1: Fiscal policy in the euro area
Fiscal
sustainability at
national level
Fiscal stance at
national and
aggregate level
Fiscal rules
Fiscal
coordination
Federal
budget
Independent fiscal
committees
European
fiscal board
MoF,
Euro Parliament
European Commission
Objectives
Instruments
Institutions
There are two objectives: scal sustainability at the national level, and scal
stabilisation at the national and aggregate levels. In textbooks, however, you
will see that there is only one objective – scal stabilisation – and that there is
one constraint – the intertemporal budget constraint. In the monetary union,
scal sustainability is considered an objective in itself, so you can imagine a
monetary union where scal sustainability is an objective because of the large
spillovers going through the nancial system.
So, let us say there are two objectives. We started in 1999 with only the top-
left part of Figure 1, with only quite simple scal rules as an instrument
to achieve scal sustainability at the national level. Then, through several
successive reshuings of the Stability and Growth Pact, the objective of scal
stabilisation at the national level was introduced through some exibilities,
making the rules much more complex. I would say that we could perhaps
nd ways to simplify these, looking for example at what the Germans did
with the adjustments accounts whereby you can put some expenditures in the
account and the account needs to balance over the cycle, so you no longer
Panel 2: Fiscal policy implementation in the EU institutional framework
and implications for monetary policy
61
need to calculate the structural decit. We then have the institutions. In order
to promote national ownership, independent scal councils were introduced
at the national level. This is shown in the rst column of Figure 1.
During 2011–2013, the aggregate scal stance of the euro area was procyclical.
With the ECB running out of instruments, the idea of an aggregate scal
stance emerged. But how can this be organised in practice? There are two ways:
scal coordination, or scal integration through a federal budget. Somewhat
surprisingly, it is not so evident that scal coordination is easier than having a
federal budget. Let me explain.
It must be very clear that scal coordination is necessary only in exceptional
times when you have large spillovers. There is a literature showing that scal
spillovers are much higher at the zero lower bound, so there is a case for scal
coordination at such times, but not necessarily at normal times when the scal
spillovers are not so evident to estimate. I very much agree that we should keep
in mind the subsidiarity principle that in normal times there should be more
weight on local institutions, provided they abide by the rules. The European
Commission is organising scal coordination with the newly created European
Fiscal Board, which will be the equivalent of national councils but at the
aggregate level. The good thing is that you do not need to change the Treaty
to do this. In the short and medium term, there is no other choice since in the
next two or three decades, most scal policy will likely remain at the national
level. This is where the weapons are, and you should coordinate where the
weapons are and not somewhere else. But, the bad thing is that there is a lot
of intrusion into national aairs – basically, you are asking a government to
do something other than what the citizens want their own government to do.
This is really very dicult.
Now let us think a bit about the other possibility: the federal budget. You should
not think of a federal budget as something very large. In the United States, as
Erik Jones said, most of the budget has nothing to do with stabilisation. So,
it is wrong to say that since you have a federal budget of 20% of GDP in the
United States, with 2% of GDP in the euro area you would have one tenth
of the US stabilisation capacity. This is completely wrong because you do not
have all the spending that doesn’t move over the cycle. Even if very small, a
federal budget can help to design more simple rules at the national level. Why
are national rules so complex? Because you have to incorporate within just
one rule the two objectives of scal sustainability and scal stabilisation. So
you need exibility, and in the end you do not understand the rule. In federal
countries, the rules are much stricter and simpler, but they are compensated
by a federal budget.
62 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Now I am going to talk under the supervision of Erik Jones, who can correct
me. Just take a look at the unemployment insurance system in the United States.
It is a state-level system that is mostly funded at the state level. The coverage
is generally 26 weeks – sometimes less, sometimes more. The contributions,
eligibility, and replacement rates all dier across states. There are two federal
layers: the Extended Benets (EB) system, co-nanced at the state level and
federal level; and the newly created Emergency Unemployment Compensation
(EUC) agency. The federal layer oers a temporary extension of benets
when the unemployment rate surges. During the crisis in 2009, the insurance
coverage went up to 99 weeks – an enormous increase – and the average
federal transfer to states was about 0.5% of GDP, which is large. The cost in
normal times is small: $42 per worker per year (0.6% of the rst $7,000 of
earnings). It could be larger in more generous countries in Europe. You can
see here that as a reinsurance scheme, it is not so large.
Why am I talking about this? Because such a scheme may prove to be a good
combination for Europe – an incentive to reform macroeconomic stabilisation
and a social initiative. We should keep in mind that what we are discussing
today is not easily understandable to the public; it is very technocratic. We have
a lot of Europhobia and so the next initiative needs to have a social component,
something for the people. We should think of the success of the Erasmus
Programme – for those students who beneted from it, it changed their life in
practice. Incentive to reform, why? To get into this kind of reinsurance system,
you need a lot of convergence (not harmonisation) of labour markets without
too much moral hazard, because it is only in very bad times that a country
would benet from the reinsurance. A variant of it could be a cheque for the
unemployed, a kind of Erasmus Programme for workers.
I will nish with a comparison of monetary integration and scal integration.
The European system was one of coordination of monetary policies. It failed
and was reshued. It was able to continue up to 1999 because there was
a rm decision to pursue monetary integration. In my view, coordination
of scal policies is something that we can do today. It will work only if we
have the long-term project of a scal union. The EU is a currency without a
sovereign. We may be right to have a currency without a sovereign, but the
euro area is an outlier in the world. We must make sure that it is sustainable
to have a currency without a budget. I know that the United States may not
be an example for Europe, but at least it is something that does exist and has
done for a long time. We should look for things that do exist and work.
Panel 2: Fiscal policy implementation in the EU institutional framework
and implications for monetary policy
63
Panellist 4: Javier J. Perez
I would like to speak on the reform of EU scal rules framework: credibility,
options and lessons for monetary policy.
Overview: Main issues
A consensus view has emerged around the general idea that EU scal rules
have become too complex.
11
Despite this complexity, the architecture of the
EU’s scal framework lacks tools for the implementation of euro-area-wide
scal stabilisation actions in particular, especially at times when monetary
policy may be subject to constraints (e.g., at the zero lower bound). A number
of proposals are currently being put forward to correct the two sets of
(interrelated) problems.
I argue in this presentation that the Achilles’ heel of the EU scal framework
is to be found in its implementation aws rather than in its complexity. At the
end of the day, the evolution of the scal rules framework has been a quest
to nd the most resilient set of rules and procedures possible. The available
international experience shows that no set of rules has been ever resilient
to lack of commitment, political pressure and time-inconsistency in their
implementation. To improve the credibility of any new or old set of rules,
greater participation has to be aorded to well-monitored national institutions
(decentralisation) and, in particular, local scal watchdogs.
Credibility and the ability to implement consistent policies are also key
elements for the second issue at stake. On the one hand, a case could exist
for pursuing an aggregate scal expansion if the euro area were subject to
an adverse, symmetric shock. The “euro area scal stance” being an abstract
concept, the practical implementation of such a policy would depend on the
incentives of heterogeneous member states. A win-win situation would be
one in which countries with enough scal space pursue expansionary policies,
while countries with limited scal space stick to policies geared towards scal
sustainability, constrained by well-designed rules. Nonetheless, moral hazard
problems – i.e., lack of trust or political willingness by the rst group, and/
or lack of incentives or free-rider attitudes in the second group – can make
such a virtuous equilibrium hard to achieve. On the other hand, a case exists
for putting in place euro-area-wide stabilisation tools to cope with adverse,
mostly asymmetric, shocks. An example of such a tool would be a common
11 See Ódor, Ľ. and Kiss, G.P. (2017), “Lost in Complexity: Towards a decentralised scal framework in Europe”, in Ľ.
Ódor (ed.), Rethinking Fiscal Policy after the Crisis, New York: Cambridge University Press.
64 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
unemployment insurance scheme. That said, a design that is immune to moral
hazard problems like those mentioned above would be needed for any new
(or old) scheme to work.
Is “complexity” really the problem?
“Maastricht rules” were simple. The medium-term anchor was public debt,
with a numerical reference value set at 60% of GDP, and the operational
target was the public decit level, with a consistent reference value set at 3%
of GDP. The system was completed by a set of procedural guidelines designed
to prevent deviations from targets ex ante (the preventive arm of the SGP), and
to correct deviations ex post should they occur (the corrective arm of the SGP).
A “no bailout” clause aimed at shielding the whole system.
These rules have been in place for almost two decades, with limited changes.
An initial period of “stress” linked to the 2000s dot-com economic recession,
and the true test of the most recent euro area sovereign debt crisis, led to the
development of additional safeguards and procedures, and to the completion
of design lags. The details are well known. Nonetheless, the evolution into
a more complex set of rules followed from the very attempt to implement
the scal rules framework: coverage against multiple contingencies (including
rules governing “exibility”), resilience during recessions, improved incentives
schemes, better-dened concepts (as in the case of the structural balance),
and so on. The fact is that real-world situations are complex, and legislative
systems and institutions across the world tend to become complex when trying
to provide adequate answers for any state of nature. This is what history
teaches us.
The question that remains to be answered, then, is whether any system of
rules is doomed to become too complex? This is particularly relevant when
one tries to assess the merits of current proposals to restart the EU’s scal
framework around a reduced set of principles. In particular, many experts
suggest that more prominence should be given to the public expenditure rule
as the operational target of the system of scal rules.
12
Let me focus on this
issue, because recent experiences with such rules in some countries has not
been encouraging.
The rst feature of a government expenditure rule is that the measure of public
expenditure that is to be constrained has to be dened. Which expenditures
are to be excluded from the rule? Unemployment benets? Large one-o
payments? Public investment? The exclusion of unemployment benets
12 See, among others, Claeys, D. and Darvas, Z. (2016), “How to reform EU scal rules”, Bruegel Opinion, April (available
at http://bruegel.org/2016/04/how-to-reform-eu-scal-rules/).
Panel 2: Fiscal policy implementation in the EU institutional framework
and implications for monetary policy
65
would be granted by its mainly cyclical nature, which leads to the issue of
dening which part of that expenditure item is cyclical and which is structural.
The exclusion of large one-o payments is not a clear-cut issue either, as the
denition of such events is far from obvious when assessed in real time. Just
to provide a few examples: Would bank bailouts always qualify? In other
words, how large is “large”? What about exceptional expenses related to health
outbreaks? And exceptional defence spending linked, for example, to terrorist
attacks or geopolitical tensions? The exclusion of public investment takes us
back to the problems experienced by “golden rules” in the past.
The second (nice) feature of public spending rules is that they are set to
constrain public nances in the medium term. But, in order to dene a
medium-term spending plan, one needs an estimate of the relevant country’s
potential GDP growth and a medium-term price anchor. The latter is easy,
as the ECB’s target is medium-term ination. But the former feature brings
us back to square one: if we were able to dene potential GDP in real time
without controversy, it is likely that nobody would be unhappy with estimating
structural government balances.
We can keep endlessly discussing the “optimal set of scal rules” and devoting
a great deal of honest intellectual eort to redening rules every now and then.
This is a necessary endeavour because, as I have argued above, institutional
systems have to evolve to accommodate new situations and to learn from
past mistakes. But what the political economy literature teaches us is that the
willingness of the relevant actors (countries, the European Commission and
the Council of the EU) to apply a given set of rules is the key to this debate.
Complexity of the rules or (real-time) implementation problems?
Let me provide some examples of practical issues that aect the implementation
of any rule, and that if dealt with by technical, non-biased bodies, would
certainly reinforce any eorts to make the system of scal rules work. I will
skip the widely analysed core issue of the causes of structural government
balance revisions,
13
with the interesting insight that real-time macro forecasts
are one major source of the real-time bias in the estimation of output gaps,
and will focus on some less standard topics.
A rst example has to do with statistics. The production of scal data in
Europe is the responsibility of independent national statistical oces and is
subject to scrutiny by the European Commission (Eurostat). Nonetheless, the
literature shows that, from a political economy point of view, governments
13 Analysed in, for example, Hernández de Cos, P., Lacuesta, A. and Moral-Benito, E. (2016), “An exploration of real-
time revisions of output gap estimates across European countries”, Bank of Spain Occasional Paper 1605.
66 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
might have incentives to resort to creative accounting practices so that the
initially released gures are distorted. In addition, frequent past data revisions
imply shifts in subsequent targeted/projected paths over the medium term,
given that government targets and projections are linked to the base year in
which these targets/projections are produced. Moreover, even in the cases in
which revisions do not present a clear recurrent pattern but are nonetheless
frequent, the comparison of successive paths of government targets might
be blurred, and may eventually undermine the soundness and consistency of
scal policy choices over time.
Table 1: Revisions to government balance-to-GDP ratios (d) over time, from
initial (Spring of year 1) to nal release (Autumn of year 4)
Pool of 15 EU countries (1998-2008)
Revision after 4 years:
r
8
t
= d
8
t
- d
1
t
Revision after 3 years:
r
6
t
= d
6
t
- d
1
t
Mean
-0.34***
Mean
-0.18**
Standard deviation
1.04
Standard deviation
0.83
Noise-to-signal ratio
0.43
No. of observations 135
No. of observations 119
Revision after 1 year:
r
3
t
= d
3
t
- d
1
t
Revision within 1st year:
r
2
t
= d
2
t
- d
1
t
Mean
-0.02
Mean 0.00
Standard deviation
0.62
Standard deviation 0.53
No. of observations 150 No. of observations 165
Notes: ***statistical signicance at 1%; ** statistical signicance at 5%.
Source: de Castro, Perez and Rodriguez-Vives (2013)
Moving to scal data, revisions to government balance gures should, in
principle, be explained by the normal and necessary updates in the underlying
statistical sources and/or by methodological improvements and changes in
accounting standards. Nevertheless, data revisions are not random. Table 1
shows how subsequent government balance revisions in the EU led to higher
decits during the 1998–2008 period. Furthermore, some recent research
14
shows that preliminary government balance data releases are biased and
14 See De Castro, F., Pérez, J.J. and Rodríguez-Vives, M. (2013), “Fiscal Data Revisions in Europe”, Journal of Money,
Credit and Banking 45(6): 1187–1209.
Panel 2: Fiscal policy implementation in the EU institutional framework
and implications for monetary policy
67
inecient predictors of subsequent releases, that such systematic bias in
government balance revisions is a rather general feature of the EU, and that
expected real GDP growth and political cycles explain revision patterns.
In addition, Eurostat’s decisions and methodological clarications leading
to forced data revisions explain a large amount of the bias towards lower
government balances, providing evidence that some individual countries might
have distorted preliminary releases of data by using accounting rules in a
partial way.
The second example has to do with the ability to anticipate scal slippages
in real time. On this point, I argue that there is room for more analysis, in
light of a recent strand of the literature that looks at scal forecasting and
monitoring issues. Figure 1 shows how international organisations and private
sector analysts forecasted the 2011 and 2015 Spanish government balance over
time. The initially released balance (the “Spring Excessive Decit Procedure
notication”) turned out to be outside of the range of all forecasts, including
that of the European Commission. The forecast errors are striking, not only
for their size but also because of the fact that even estimates produced with
information up to the very end of the year were far o the released data. A
recent line of research shows that these errors could have been reduced if a
formal and transparent role had been assigned to short-term scal indicators
based on public accounts data.
15
In the case of the example chosen for Figure
1, the forecast errors turned out to be extremely policy relevant. As regards
the 2011 forecast, the shock undermined the scal credibility of the newly
elected Spanish government, acting as a catalyst for the sovereign debt stress
that Spain was subject to over the course of 2012 and for the associated change
in the EDP policy path. As for the 2015 error, it led to Spain being subject
over the course of 2016 to a step-up in the EDP process, and led to a new
change in the EDP adjustment path that aected the credibility of the entire
EU system of scal rules.
15 For a discussion of the case of Spain and for references to other studies for the EU as a whole, see Pedregal, D.J.,
Pérez, J.J. and Sánchez, A.J. (2014), “A toolkit to strengthen government budget surveillance”, Hacienda Pública
Española / Review of Public Economics 211(4): 117–146.
68 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Figure 1: Evolution of government balance forecasts for Spain for 2011 (top
panel) and 2015 (bottom panel) from the European Commission, IMF and
OECD
-9.5
-8.5
-7.5
-6.5
-5.5
03/10 06/10 09/10 12/10 03/11 06/11 09/11 12/11
Consensus Forecast Official target EC IMF OECD
% of GDP
Spring 2012 EDP
Notification
-6.5
-6.0
-5.5
-5.0
-4.5
-4.0
-3.5
01/01/2014 01/04/2014 01/07/2014 01/10/2014 01/01/2015 01/04/2015 01/07/2015 01/10/2015 01/01/2016
Consensus Forecast Official target EC IMF OECD
% of GDP
Spring
2016 EDP
Notification
Source: Author’s calculations.
Panel 2: Fiscal policy implementation in the EU institutional framework
and implications for monetary policy
69
A third example is related to the previous one and looks at the ability of
independent institutions such as the European Commission to reduce biases
in monitoring scal rules in real time. Recent research
16
shows that the scal
forecasts of international agencies are aected to some extent by the same
type of problems that the literature widely acknowledges for governmental
forecasts: bias linked to political cycles or the inuence of opportunistic GDP
cycles. The main reason is that informational shortages may lead sta of
independent agencies to internalise “political biases” in governmental forecasts
when trying to grasp genuine “private information”, given that international
analysts have to solve a signal extraction problem to separate “true” from
“biased” information in data provided by governmental agencies themselves.
What can be learnt from the implementation aws?
The previous examples have clear-cut policy implications.
First, independent national scal institutions might be a natural option, to the
extent that they may have better access to inside national information than
international organisations, allowing them to perform closer monitoring of
ocial budgetary projections, in particular regarding transparency requisites,
accountability and the threat of sanctions. National scal watchdogs tend to
have better inside knowledge of the legal framework, more granular data
knowledge, and also advantages when dealing with legislation and government
documents in national language. This could be of particular relevance to
highly scally decentralised countries, given the hurdle of dealing with centre-
subnational nancing arrangements.
Second, we need to devote more resources to developing, monitoring and
auditing statistics, as the basis of the whole system of scal rules is reliable data.
A balance has to be struck between the number of economists commenting
on and analysing data, and the number of statisticians producing them.
Finally, short-term scal indicators (monthly and quarterly scal data) should be
formally included in the European multilateral scal surveillance process. Their
formal use in the public discussion would certainly enhance the preventive
arm of the Stability and Growth Pact, making it possible to acknowledge scal
slippages early enough that pressure to take corrective measures could be put
on governments by EU institutions and the public at large
16 See, for example, Merola, R. and Pérez, J.J. (2013), “Fiscal forecast errors: governments versus independent
agencies?”, European Journal of Political Economy 32(C): 285–299.
70 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
The way forward: Decentralisation or EU-wide mechanisms?
The preceding discussion would lead me to favour Ľudovít Ódor’s “realist”
option – i.e., the EU needs to move the emphasis to reinforcing national
scal frameworks, including by giving more prominence to national scal
watchdogs. Further decentralisation to the national level, though, carries the
need to incorporate a credible “no bailout” clause by the centre (i.e., by the
European Commission and the monetary union partners). The international
experiences of subnational scal crises are not very promising in this regard.
The key open question here is: What is the legal design that would allow a
credible application of the “no bailout” clause? At the EU level, the recent
bailouts of programme countries indicate that for the monetary union to
survive, a lax approach may have to be taken in certain circumstances. Within
EU countries, the recent Spanish experience also shows that strict national rules
may not provide a credible safeguard when it comes to bailing out regional
governments subject to high scal stress.
The latter example makes it clear that for the monetary union to move
forward, a parallel movement in the direction of centralisation is also needed
beyond the role that credible scal rules may provide as implicit coordination
mechanisms. In this regard, the proposal of the Presidency to deepen the
scal pillar of EMU is warranted. The recent economic crisis, in particular
through its sovereign debt crisis face, has made it extremely clear that for a
monetary union to function properly, some type of common or coordinated
scal capacity at the area level should be put in place. The latter applies,
in the rst place, to the design of centralised risk-sharing mechanisms to
cope with asymmetric shocks. Moreover – and even more importantly at the
current juncture of low economic growth and the zero lower bound – a smart
management of the available scal space at the euro area level should cater
for the development of some type of common discretionary response to cater
for shocks of a symmetric, aggregate nature.
The strengthening of a centralised scal capacity, though, has to be designed
so as to minimise moral hazard risks and permanent transfers from some
countries to others. There are various alternatives in the literature that do
respect these conditions and, as a consequence, deserve to be explored and
adopted. The EMU project clearly deserves bold steps to be taken in this
regard. Beyond “public risk-sharing mechanisms”, though, it is important to
stress that there is margin to improve “private risk sharing” at the EMU level.
Eliminating barriers to a more complete integration of capital, credit and
Panel 2: Fiscal policy implementation in the EU institutional framework
and implications for monetary policy
71
labour markets is a must from this perspective. In this regard, completing a
genuine banking union is a necessary companion for further developing the
scal pillar in the EMU.
Panellist 5: Cláudia Rodriguez Braz
17
The recent economic and nancial crisis led to a widespread increase in general
government decits and debt in EU member states. The increase was more
acute in countries with structural weaknesses and fragile public nances that
faced the impact of pronounced economic recessions and strong public support
to the nancial sector. This environment placed severe pressure on the EU’s
institutional framework, which has undergone several changes to adapt to
the new challenges. Amongst these adjustments, it is important to highlight
the higher degree of complexity/exibility introduced in the Stability and
Growth Pact and the establishment of independent scal institutions (IFIs) at
the national level to reinforce the monitoring role of the European surveillance
mechanism. In the context of the economic recovery, improved underlying
scal positions (albeit still with very high debt ratios) and fully operational
IFIs in most member states, it might be useful to have an informed discussion
on the role of scal policy and the optimal institutional set-up in the current
juncture. In this respect, two questions are certainly relevant:
• Can scal policy play a role in stabilising the economy at the euro area level?
• What role should IFIs play in the European scal architecture?
Related to the last question, another noteworthy question is:
• If a bigger role is allocated to IFIs, does scal analysis at the level of national
central banks become obsolete?
I will now address these three questions in turn.
Can scal policy play a role in stabilising the economy at the euro
area level?
In simple terms, a scal stance can be described as the impact of scal policy
on economic activity. However, its measurement is not straightforward. Most
economic analysis uses a denition based on the change in the cyclically
adjusted (or structural) general government balance (total or primary). The
17 The views expressed here are my own and do not necessarily represent those of Banco de Portugal or the Working
Group on Public Finance (WGPF) of the European System of Central Banks. The opinions conveyed here have
beneted substantially from the discussions and the work carried out by the WGPF, which is a privileged forum for
scal policy analysis.
72 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
concept has been widely applied at the country level, but the notion of a euro
area scal stance, as the aggregate of national policies, and its appropriateness
received limited attention in the past. However, this situation has changed
recently for three reasons:
i. the prevailing economic conditions associated with low protracted growth,
a still signicant negative output gap (-1.1% in 2016 in the euro area as a
whole, according to the Spring 2016 European Commission forecasts)
18
and an unemployment rate that is expected to remain high, in particular
in countries that were most severely hit by the crisis;
ii. constrained monetary policy, with interest rates crossing the zero lower
bound and the implementation of non-conventional measures; and
iii. institutional developments, with the establishment of an independent
advisory European Fiscal Board by October 2015
19
(expected to become
operational by mid-2016) mandated to evaluate the euro area scal stance.
Given these conditions, it is easy to understand the debate around the use of
national scal policies for exceptional support for a faster closure of the euro
area output gap. However, as there are still considerable risks to sovereign
debt sustainability prevailing in several countries, the answer to this question
depends ultimately on how the costs associated with the failure to meet the
stabilisation and sustainability objectives are assessed and weighed.
20
The application of discretionary scal policy has well-known serious drawbacks.
Indeed, besides the implementation lag, given the time period that usually exists
between recognising the need for an intervention and the actual enacting of
a scal measure, there also are problems associated with the reversibility of
such scal measures and the limited capacity to assess the state of the economy
in real time. In fact, this explains the strand of the literature advocating that
in normal times, the stabilising role of scal policy should be based solely on
the functioning of automatic stabilisers. In a situation where an expansionary
scal policy in one member state would be used to stimulate the economic
activity of the euro area as a whole, the uncertainty in terms of the magnitude
of spillover eects adds to the above-mentioned shortcomings.
18 https://ec.europa.eu/info/publications/economy-nance/european-economic-forecast-spring-2016_en.
19 “On steps towards completing Economic and Monetary Union”, Communication from the European Commission,
October 2015 (available at https://ec.europa.eu/transparency/regdoc/rep/1/2015/EN/1-2015-600-EN-F1-1.
PDF).
20 See European Commission (2015), Report on Public Finances in EMU 2015, Brussels (available at https://ec.europa.eu/
info/publications/economy-nance/report-public-nances-emu-2015_en).
Panel 2: Fiscal policy implementation in the EU institutional framework
and implications for monetary policy
73
In the original set-up of EMU, the scal stance should be determined by
the national objectives to ensure scal sustainability and not be driven by
stabilisation needs. However, the Stability and Growth Pact includes several
elements that consider the state of the economy in the application of scal
rules. For example, in the denition of the Medium-Term Objective (MTO),
a safety margin is taken into account in order to safeguard respect of the
Treaty reference values for the decit and the debt at times of negative output
gaps. Additionally, in the preventive arm of the Pact, the pace of convergence
towards the MTO also takes into account the cyclical position of the economy
(the new “exibility matrix”) and, in the corrective arm, a general escape clause
might be used in case of a severe economic downturn for the euro area or the
EU as a whole. All these provisions do not automatically ensure a desirable
euro area scal stance and, as such, the original focus on sustainability of the
EU scal architecture remains.
Figure 1: Fiscal space in the euro area, 2016
!"#$
!"#%
!&#'
!&#(
!&#%
!&#%
!$#)
!$#*
!$#*
!$#$
!$#%
!%#*
!%#+
!%#&
%#%
%#%
%#+
%#,
$#,
-.
/0
-1
.2
34
10
12
-5
62
31
78
89
:2
82
;4
00
<=
>0
8?
Note: Fiscal space measured by the dierence between the 2016 structural balance (EC) and
the MTO.
Source: European Commission and own calculations.
74 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
The recourse to scal policy for stabilisation purposes depends heavily on an
evaluation of the scal space. According to the IMF,
21
scal space can be dened
as the availability of budgetary room that allows a government to provide
resources for a desired purpose without any prejudice to the sustainability
of a government’s nancial position. While there is some agreement around
this broad denition, the actual measurement of scal space varies widely
depending on the method or model used, which points to the need for caution
when delivering policy recommendations. If a simple, rules-based denition
based on the dierence between the European Commission estimate for the
2016 structural balance and the country-specic MTO is used, it can be shown
that currently the scal space in all euro area countries is very limited, with
the exception of Luxembourg, Germany and, to a lesser extent, Cyprus (see
Figure 1). It is important to highlight that the absence of scal space does
not preclude a growth-friendly recomposition of government revenue and
expenditure, where economic activity would benet through means of the
dierent scal multipliers of the instruments used.
In any case, if a more expansionary euro area scal stance were judged to
be desirable, this would require coordination of scal policies. Following the
Five Presidents’ Report,
22
there has been some discussion of the creation of a
scal capacity which could address, amongst other possibilities, asymmetric
macroeconomic shocks. If a proposal of this type were to materialise, it would
have the advantage of ensuring ex ante national contributions, while allowing
eorts to be directed to countries with greater negative output gaps, which
typically have higher scal multipliers. However, there would be the risk of
free-riding behaviour, in particular through the postponement of important
structural reforms. In addition, it should be noted that a scal capacity per se
would only ensure an impact in the euro area scal stance in case of mismatch
between the timing of contributions and the use of funds or the existence
of a direct borrowing facility at the aggregate level. A scal union (or a euro
area treasury, as foreseen in the Five Presidents’ Report) would make a desirable
scal stance easier to achieve, as scal sustainability and stabilisation would
be determined at the euro area level. However, this would imply potentially
signicant risk sharing and consequently would require a far-reaching transfer
of scal sovereignty to the euro area level, which could be considered a
drawback from the perspective of some individual member states. Finally, it
21 Heller, P.S. (2005), “Understanding Fiscal Space”, IMF Policy Discussion Paper PDP/05/4 (available at www.imf.
org/external/pubs/ft/pdp/2005/pdp04.pdf).
22 Juncker, J.C. in close cooperation with Tusk, D., Dijsselbloem, J., Draghi, M. and Schulz, M. (2015), The Five Presidents’
Report: Completing Europe’s Economic and Monetary Union, Brussels: European Commission.
Panel 2: Fiscal policy implementation in the EU institutional framework
and implications for monetary policy
75
is worth highlighting that both a scal capacity and scal union would need
to be carefully designed and their practical implementation would likely be
a lengthy process.
What role should independent scal institutions play in the European
scal architecture?
With the establishment of IFIs in almost all EU countries, a debate on the role
of these institutions in the European scal architecture has emerged. Some
argue that Europe should move towards a decentralised framework in terms
of scal surveillance. If this was to be the case, IFIs could play a crucial role.
According to a survey carried out in the second half of 2015 by the ESCB
Working Group on Public Finances (the results of which were not made public),
the IFIs’ setup and functioning are currently found to have limited weaknesses.
However, there are still some concerns in terms of sta resources, access to
information and the risk of political bias in the respective assessments.
The tasks of IFIs are diversied, but most make an ex post assessment of key
budgetary documents, such as the budget and the update of the stability
and convergence programmes. As they have no sanctioning power, their
eectiveness comes mainly through peer pressure exerted by the inuence of
public opinion. If IFIs were to deviate from their monitoring role, for example
by proposing concrete guidelines for the scal measures to be adopted by
governments, they would most likely be considered responsible for the almost
inevitable failures.
One possible solution to this dilemma would be to improve the institutional
framework by reinforcing the set of rules at the national level. The design
of an optimal scal rule is, however, extremely dicult. On the one hand,
overly simple rules are transparent and easily understood by the public but
do not work because they are easily circumvented. On the other hand, state-
contingent rules are best, but a certain degree of complexity may lead to
manipulation and uneven implementation. It is also important to note that
political economy arguments are relevant not only at the enforcement stage, but
also at the time of the approval of the rule, where loopholes may deliberately
be left in place.
To sum up, reinforcement of the national scal frameworks to allow IFIs to
play a greater role would replicate to some extent the problems faced at the
EU level.
76 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
If a bigger role is allocated to IFIs, does scal analysis at the national
central bank level become obsolete?
Some argue that there is a “scal policy obsession by central banks”, but at
times of institutional rearrangement it is denitely worth rethinking the role
of national central banks in scal analysis.
While all central banks in the European Union publicly communicate to some
extent on government scal policies, there is considerable heterogeneity in the
scope and method of communication. There have been a few changes recently
in most central banks’ public communications on scal policies, but these have
mostly gone in the direction of more public communication.
Communication by central banks on scal policies can be regarded as a
complement rather than a substitute to the public and independent assessment
of scal councils. Several arguments support this view. First, central banks
are concerned with the implications of scal policy for monetary policy.
Second, the public scrutiny of governments’ scal policies improves if dierent
independent institutions are publishing the respective assessments, as there
are more informed views on the subject. Third, central banks can refer to
the IFI assessments, reinforcing the messages to be conveyed. Finally, the past
experiences of countries where an IFI has existed for a long period co-existing
with scal analysis carried out by the central bank, as for example is the case
in the Netherlands with CPB, supports the complementary view.
General discussion
Erik Jones: I would like to start by asking a few questions to the panellists.
The audience can then chip in with any questions or concerns they may have.
Can you have a credible “no bailout” clause with political entities of such
radically dierent sizes? It is one thing to let the city of Mobile in Alabama
go bankrupt. But, can you really let New York City go bankrupt? By the same
token, can you have a credible “no bailout” clause when sovereign and bank
nances are so deeply intertwined? If you were to look at the history of the
United States, when states tend to get bailed out is when their banks are in
trouble. So, the savings and loans crisis was all about bailing out state-based
banking systems. Spain would have loved that in 2012.
The second set of issues has to do with perceptions of solidarity. Every time I
talk to nance ministers about successful structural reform, they tell me that
national ownership is the key. But, they only say that in the context of their own
country. When they look at other countries, they describe national ownership
in terms of moral hazard. I wonder if you can reconcile the tension, because
Panel 2: Fiscal policy implementation in the EU institutional framework
and implications for monetary policy
77
I sense the absence of a German voice on this panel who would look at the
structural reform debate and say that the concessions that you need to oer
to make that work are not concessions that we want to see.
The third issue has to do with the explanation or justication of cross-border
transfers, particularly in the context of unemployment insurance, especially
when unemployment surges generate histories. Here, I would point to cases like
Italy and Belgium, where cross-regional transfers to support unemployment
ended up as a long-term problem and developed into serious political
movements against the unity of the country. In Italy, that did not play out as
badly as it could have done. In terms of simple rules that you can get at the
sub-national level if you have a federal scal entity, I wonder about that fallacy
of composition. Think about how much easier President Obama’s life would
have been in 2010–2011 if the state governments had not all been following
balanced budget rules and crushing public sector employment at the same time.
Obama introduced scal stimulus and then the state governments subtracted it
because they all followed the same very simple scal rules. I think that Obama
would have preferred not to have had that.
The last issue is how we insulate our scal authorities from the activities of the
private sector. A lot of the private-sector debt creation is going to migrate into
the public sector. If you want to see an example of that, look at the whole pay
cheque lending issue in the United States. Pay cheque lenders are short-term,
small dollar lenders. They are all regulated at the state level and the federal
government is terried of these guys because of their implications in terms
of social distress and, ultimately in the long term, in terms of scal policy.
Ardo Hansson (Eesti Pank): I think the Chair has led us to this point on
whether the panellists have any view on the desirability of an orderly state
bankruptcy or insolvency procedures for sovereigns in Europe and whether
this is a part of the institutional framework. As you listen to Minister Mramor
on how dicult it is and that everything is changing, that there are countries
that think rules are too exible and others that think that they are not exible
enough, maybe market forces are a bit of a substitute. Could you simplify
things if you had a bit more market discipline? A recent paper by Dellas and
Tavlas
23
compared the gold standard with the recent European experience. The
gold standard was a very extreme corner solution, with a common currency
but no common institutions and no coordination. Presumably, scally at least
it worked. So, whether or not rules are moving somewhere in that direction,
substituting markets for rules might make sense.
23 Dellas, H. and Tavlas, G.S. (2013), “The Gold Standard, the Euro, and the Origins of the Greek Sovereign Debt
Crisis” (available at https://object.cato.org/sites/cato.org/les/serials/les/cato-journal/2013/9/cjv33n3-13.pdf).
78 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Giovanni Dell’Ariccia (IMF): I was surprised that nobody mentioned the
banking union in this panel. A full banking union is probably one of the most
striking dierences between the US system and what we have in the euro
area. You can have the city of Detroit going bankrupt but not leaving the
dollar. In the euro area at the moment, you cannot have severe distress on the
scal side without risking a run on the banks. We witnessed something like
that very recently. What is the minimum level of banking union that would
change the situation?
Mejra Festić (Bank of Slovenia): We know that we have dierent GDP
structures, dierent productivity and dierent purchasing power across
European countries. Nevertheless, there are some trends and intentions for
scal centralisation and scal union. I would like to compare scal union with
the European deposit insurance scheme phases. It is too early to implement
the European deposit insurance scheme because we have less systemically
important banks, dierent supervision of these banks, dierent bankruptcy
procedures, dierent out-of-court restructuring and compulsory debt
settlement. So what is your opinion, if we compare these two instruments?
Within what time span would it be feasible to full and integrate scal union
and the European deposit insurance scheme?
Johannes Clemens (Deutsche Bundesbank): Drawing on his experience,
Minister Dušan Mramor showed us how scal policy functions in reality,
especially with regard to the structural budget balance. As Javier Perez pointed
out, I would say that the measurement problem of the structural budget
balance or potential output is not just in the volatility of its measurement but
also in its bias. Usually, those who estimate potential output have a bias towards
overestimating it. From a political economy angle, this is quite rational. It is a
great story for politicians to be below potential output most of the time because
then you can do something. This is for me a theoretical explanation for the
debt bias of scal policies. I also would like to raise another point related to
the interconnection between scal stance and the Stability and Growth Pact
limits that started in 2012. Should this be interpreted as the functioning of
Mario Draghi’s “whatever it takes” statement
24
in order to give a signal that
the scal policy stance could be loosened because monetary policy would bail
out scal policy?
Erik Jones: We have questions on market discipline, banking union, deposit
insurance, measurement bias and scal stance. I would like to invite each of
our panellists to respond to any of the themes that they want.
24 www.ecb.europa.eu/press/key/date/2012/html/sp120726.en.html.
Panel 2: Fiscal policy implementation in the EU institutional framework
and implications for monetary policy
79
Cláudia Rodriguez Braz: More market discipline is surely welcome, but it is
not possible to safeguard an adequate reaction of markets to the circumstances
and with appropriate timing. Indeed, there is some literature that points to
sudden (and over-) reactions by nancial markets. Overall market discipline
can help, but it is not a solution to all problems per se.
A question was also asked about the possibility of having a mechanism for
the orderly restructuring of debt. My opinion is that the issue is not on the
table for the time being. In the current European framework, in particular at
the euro area level, a mechanism exists solely for assisting in case of liquidity
problems (the European Stability Mechanism) but not for when solvency is a
high risk. In any case, I believe that some steps in the direction of establishing
such a mechanism will be adopted in the coming years.
The establishment of a European deposit insurance scheme would go in the
direction of decoupling banks from sovereigns and help in managing sovereign
crises. There are, indeed, some similarities in the diculties of establishing a
European deposit insurance scheme and a scal union. As has been pointed
out here today, a scal union with sovereign states that have dierent national
rules, dierent cultures, dierent fundamentals and dierent social preferences
will be extremely dicult to launch in the near future.
Finally, I fully agree that the discussion of the use of scal policy with a
stabilisation purpose that occurred in 2012 might have been distorted because
of the potential output bias. In any case, the sustainability objective should
have been present at the time, as the scal space was also quite limited then.
Lucio R. Pench: There are too many questions on the table. It was remarked
that banking union was absent from the discussion. It is a good remark. Speaking
in a personal capacity, it remains a question whether we should implement a
full banking union, including the scal back stop, deposit insurance and all
the other elements. Could this conceivably be enough over and above a scal
union to make a full banking union work? It is true that a banking union, if
so implemented, would have important stabilisation properties. Still, I wonder
whether in the absence of a common safe asset, one would have an opposite
comparison with the situation in the United States.
This links to the issue of a sovereign restructuring mechanism. At the end of
my presentation I spoke, though vaguely, about the reinstatement of the “no
bailout” rule which, in fact, was avoided in the course of the crisis. I believe it
could be argued that precisely because of the problem with relying exclusively
on market discipline, a solution that would go in the direction of reinstating the
“no bailout” rule, including exposure limits for public debt on banks, should
80 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
be explicit as to be accompanied by other elements in terms of creation of
a common safe asset. One could envision a grand bargain, ideally, but this
would be very dicult to implement in practice.
Agnès Bénassy-Quéré: On the “no bailout” clause, there is a very good book
by Cottarelli and Guerguil
25
that looks at the experience of federal countries,
where sub-national entities have scal problems that are as dirty as what we
have in the euro area. It is very clear that there is no bailout for small entities;
you let them fail. But for the big entities this is never the case, not even in
Germany. We will have to deal with these dirty solutions. However, we won’t
be safe unless sovereign debts can be restructured without triggering a systemic
crisis. I think the ESM could play a role here to stop contagion when this kind
of thing happens. In the short term, we have a problem with the banks. For
the banks, a big challenge is how to diversify sovereign risk on their asset side.
Sometimes we forget that sovereign bonds are the ultimate source of liquidity.
So, we should not penalise banks for holding these bonds. I agree that they
should hold diversied debt in safe assets. The challenge is how to move from
one situation to the other.
For deposit insurance, I do not understand why we are not restricting deposit
insurance to those banks which are directly supervised by the SSM. Who
should pay for an error in supervision? At one point, if you do not have a
backstop for deposit insurance and if the SSM makes a massive error on
a bank, then you have to ask the national government and other banks of
the country to pay for the error. This is impossible. We need to put scal
responsibility in line with governance.
About unemployment insurance, what is important is the dierence between
the unemployment rate and the moving average of unemployment rate. It
is not a permanent transfer; after two years it stops. In France, you have a
stable unemployment rate, so unemployment insurance would not benet
this country. There have been some simulations showing that during the past
such a scheme would have beneted Germany and Spain, with no permanent
transfers. You can design it so that it does not happen.
Ľudovít Ódor: When I presented the proposal for the new institutional
framework, there were two items at the bottom of Figure 1 – the two necessary
building blocks for any kind of successful scal framework in the euro area.
First, a well-functioning banking (or nancial market) union. Currently, we
have too much reliance on bank nancing compared to the United States, high
concentration risks and zero sovereign risk weights. In my view, there is still
25 Cottarelli, C. and Guerguil, M. (2015), Designing a European Fiscal Union: Lessons from the Experience of Fiscal Federations,
Abingdon, UK: Routledge.
Panel 2: Fiscal policy implementation in the EU institutional framework
and implications for monetary policy
81
a lot of work to do in order to create a nancial Single Market. The second
necessary element I mentioned was an ex ante sovereign resolution scheme.
Europe should face the moral hazard problem not only from the borrower
side (by implementing smart scal rules in synergies with scal independent
institutions) but also from the lender side. It can be done by specifying (ex ante)
the amount of losses bond investors can expect in case of sovereign insolvency.
In that case, market participants will be more reluctant to lend to irresponsible
governments. Also, market signals can be enhanced through the presence of
truly independent scal institutions capable of uncovering the true state of
public nances in real time.
My second point is on the uncertainty surrounding the real-time measurement
of the output gap. We estimated this uncertainty by comparing dierent
vintages of the structural budget balance calculated by the common EU
methodology. In the case of structural adjustment, the average dierence
between the most optimistic vintages compared to the most pessimistic ones
was around 0.5% of GDP. Moreover, for countries that joined the EU in 2004,
the sign of the change in the output gap changed in 40% of the cases. In my
view, instead of focusing on the structural budget balance, it is much better to
use the evolution of expenditures (adjusted to discretionary revenue measures)
as the most important operational guide for scal policy.
Dušan Mramor: We also made an analysis of what the mistakes here are.
There is a big dierence between new EU member states and old EU member
states. The smaller the country and the newer the member, the bigger the
dierence. You know which country has the best results? Germany. So, this
methodology is quite well adapted to the changes in Germany, but it is not
well adapted for especially small countries. It is procyclical, and what we found
is that the output gap is positive when it should not be. That means that it is
pushing scal policy to be restrictive. At the same time, more restrictive scal
policy is the consequence of uncertainty, as I explained earlier during my
presentation. So, the new EU members are forced to have much more severe
austerity programmes than are sensible in order to be within the lines of the
Stability and Growth Pact. Ex post, you nd out that the scal stance was too
conservative. It is very interesting when you study this topic. There are many
questions – very big ones – but I leave this today to academics.
Javier J. Perez: This discussion on observables is important, but I will
draw your attention to the fact that observables are sometimes quite hard
to understand when it comes to accounting issues. Sometimes, relying on
observables is a complicated theme.
82 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
On the “no bailout” clause, the problem is that the only real solution to this
clause is to have some type of debt-restructuring mechanism. This is what we
have learnt from the experience of other areas, including the United States.
Otherwise, there is an intermediate alternative: “funds for conditionality”,
which is what we do with the ESM. But, the restructuring can have many forms.
Finally, on national ownership and on coordination of scal and monetary
policies, since monetary policy is at the zero lower bound, in case of an
“accident” it could be the case that some type of scal stimulus is needed at
some point. The governance of a “coordinated scal reaction” is complicated,
as there are many ways of implementing it. How can we share the burden
among countries? Sometimes, the debates just focus on asking Germany to
expand public investment. I do not think this is the only way. We should be
creative and think about this issue from dierent perspectives, playing with
the exibility embedded in the current scal rules framework.
Panel 3
Conducting monetary policy when
scal space is limited
Chair
Dubravko Mihaljek, Bank for International Settlements
Lead Speaker
Hans-Helmut Kotz, SAFE Policy Center, Goethe Universität, Frankfurt and
Center for European Studies, Harvard University
Panellists
Ardo Hansson, Governor, Eesti Pank
Jozef Makúch, Governor, National Bank of Slovakia
Boris Vujčić, Governor, Croatian National Bank
Gent Sejko, Governor, Bank of Albania
Vitas Vasiliauskas, Chairman, Bank of Lithuania
Lubomír Lízal, Board Member, Czech National Bank
Summary of Panel 3
Dubravko Mihaljek
A short answer to the question implicit in the title of this session – How dicult
is it to conduct monetary policy when scal space is limited? – is “very dicult”.
There is broad agreement on several issues regarding monetary and scal
policies considered on their own and interacting with each other. However, we
still do not fully understand how the two policies could be eectively combined
in a new post-crisis environment in Europe. We are still far from understanding
how to create the conditions for implementation of structural policies, which
everyone sees as a key ingredient of the macroeconomic policy mix in the
prevailing environment.
First, on monetary policy. All panellists seemed to agree that without the
expansionary measures taken so far, economic growth in Europe would have
been much weaker. That said, further easing is not seen as a priority at this
84 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
point. For instance, Estonia is experiencing nominal wage growth of 6.5%,
with ination negative and real GDP rising by only about 1.5% per annum. As
Ardo Hansson asked pointedly, does one need to further stimulate the economy
in this situation and get wages growing at 8% a year? Or, take the case of
Slovakia, which is not showing clear signs of overheating. Jozef Makúch noted
astutely that it was not necessary to consider further accommodative measures
at this point, given that the recently introduced non-standard measures have
not had the time to do what they were intended to do. Moreover, banks have
already seen margins between lending and deposit rates severely squeezed. So,
additional lowering of policy rates would further reduce banking sector prots.
In the case of Croatia, Boris Vujčić argued persuasively that the focus should
not be on further easing but rather on bank and corporate balance sheets
repair. The Croatian National Bank has already created 2.5 to 3 times more
liquidity, in relative terms, than the ECB by relaxing the macroprudential tools
that had been tightened during the credit boom. However, banks cannot place
all that liquidity because the real sector is highly indebted and lacks adequate
equity and collateral to resume borrowing. The Bank of Albania faces a similar
challenge. It lowered policy rates from 6.5% in 2008 to a historical low of
1.25% at present, injected liquidity into the banking system, and widened the
range of eligible collateral for central bank lending facilities. And yet, Gent
Sejko was concerned that the easy nancing conditions thus created were
not being transmitted to the real sector because of extreme risk aversion of
domestic banks – or rather, their parent institutions in the euro area – and
high indebtedness of Albanian rms.
Regarding scal policy, there was broad agreement that the concept of scal
space was too elusive and dicult to measure to be a reliable benchmark for
the calibration of scal policy, not to mention the adjustment of scal and
monetary policy stances. In country after country, the amount of scal space
was grossly overestimated in the run-up to the crisis. So how could anyone
be sure that the countries being asked to “do more” in terms of scal policy
today really had the room to do so? Vitas Vasiliauskas presented some shocking
evidence to this eect: only four out of 28 EU countries fully complied with
the scal provisions of the Stability and Growth Pact this year. Ardo Hansson
argued that having a bit of scal space did not mean a country should use
it. In particular, countries in EMU needed more scal space than otherwise
because, as Hans-Helmut Kotz put it cogently, there were no backstop facilities
at the national level – national central banks in the common currency area
could not act as lenders of last resort to rescue domestic banks as, for instance,
the Bank of England did. Lubomír Lízal reminded us that even in countries
Panel 3: Conducting monetary policy when scal space is limited
85
which looked scally sound at rst sight, scal space was an illusion when one
took into account contingent public-sector liabilities arising from health care,
pensions and other costs of ageing populations.
Even without questioning the concept of scal space, many panellists had
reservations about the potential eectiveness of scal expansion at this
juncture. There was broad agreement that most countries had room to boost
private investment and keep decits unchanged by altering the composition
of taxes and public spending, for instance by reducing the tax burden on
labour and capital and cutting red tape. However, the idea that one could
jump-start an economy recovering from the nancial crisis by pumping public
funds into infrastructure projects seemed a bit simplistic. Granted, there was
the possibility of locking in near-zero or even negative funding costs for some
advanced economy governments, and most economies did have signicant
public infrastructure needs, as illustrated by Hans-Helmut Kotz.
However, implementing large-scale projects is tricky. Good governance and
thorough cost-benet assessments are crucial for appropriate project selection
and preventing cost overruns. Even in advanced economies, the planning and
execution of infrastructure projects may not be as ecient as often assumed.
Even if current funding costs are low, this does not necessarily mean that
all public projects are worthwhile. Interest rates will at some point rise from
the current exceptionally low levels. With a project’s expected life of several
decades, the rates of return would have to be assessed against interest rates
over the long term.
A related point concerns the impact of low interest rates on public debt. As
Boris Vujčić noted, low interest rates have temporarily prevented a snowballing
of debt servicing costs and made scal positions look better than they really
are. Lower interest payments also seem to translate into higher credit ratings
– rating agencies do not seem to look through the current record-low interest
rates fully when evaluating sovereign creditworthiness. But, this eect will not
last forever. This is one more reason to start working on structural reforms.
With monetary policy overburdened and scal policy generally having limited
room for manoeuvre, the use of complementary policies to support growth
becomes a key issue. One option explored by non-euro area members such as
the Czech Republic (and earlier, Switzerland) is foreign exchange intervention
to limit currency appreciation. Lubomír Lízal outlined the achievements of this
approach so far, but noted that it could not be recommended more generally.
The Czech Republic, like Switzerland, was running external surpluses and
86 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
had a strong banking system. Nevertheless, the idea that exchange rate policy
could be used to support the ination targeting framework is becoming more
mainstream.
Hans-Helmut Kotz reminded us of another macroeconomic policy that has
been almost forgotten since its heyday in the 1970s and 1980s: incomes policy.
One of the few countries that still practices incomes policy is Germany. The
institutionalised practice of coordinated wage settlement and disciplined
labour unions have provided a highly eective way of restraining real exchange
rate appreciation.
Regarding structural policies, a key challenge in practice seems to be nding and
then seizing a window of opportunity to implement such reforms. There are
always plenty of excuses: strong resistance to health care and pension reforms in
ageing societies (known in Japan as “silver democracy”); a prolonged weakness
in economic conditions that increases labour unions’ focus on employment
protection; weak scal positions, which make it dicult to compensate the
losers from reforms; and so on. But on those rare occasions when politicians
nally seize the opportunity and implement structural reforms, they seem to
work small wonders – witness the Hartz reforms in Germany in the 2000s,
or currently (and half the world away), the energy and telecoms reforms
in Mexico. Most often, however, structural reforms are implemented under
duress, as in Spain post-crisis, which partly gives them negative publicity.
From the OECD work, we know by now quite a bit about the benets and
costs of structural reforms in the short and long run. However, we know
precious little about the political economy of their implementation. Another
shocking statistic discovered by Vitas Vasiliauskas is that none of the EU states
fully addressed any out of more than 100 country-specic recommendations
by the European Commission for 2015 and 2016, while more than 90% of
reform recommendations were addressed with only limited or some progress.
This brings us to a deeper issue raised by Hans-Helmut Kotz: the analytical
foundation of euro area policymaking is the rational expectations revolution
in macroeconomics and its policy ineectiveness proposition. One corollary
of this theory is strict separation between monetary and scal policies.
Monetary policy was thus assigned a single objective (price stability) and a
single instrument (the interest rate). Fiscal policy was assigned largely the
allocation role (ideally, as neutral as possible), while its stabilisation function was
reduced to automatic scal stabilisers (given that discretionary policy of any
kind was deemed suboptimal) and ensuring debt sustainability, i.e., satisfying
the intertemporal budget constraint. There was no need, or indeed scope,
for monetary–scal policy coordination in this world. These ideas stood in
Panel 3: Conducting monetary policy when scal space is limited
87
sharp contrast to the earlier Keynesian teaching, which argued that monetary
and scal policies acted through a common funnel – aggregate demand –
and therefore could and should be coordinated to nd an optimal stance of
individual policies.
Nor was there any concept of nancial stability policies in this idealised world,
partly because we did not experience the full eects of nancial liberalisation
and globalisation until we were hit by the global nancial crisis. Central banks
that used macroprudential tools before the crisis, such as Croatia and Spain,
were considered in some ways obeat: how could their policymakers pretend
to know what “excessive” credit growth was?
Eight years after the global nancial crisis, it is clear whose policies went o
track. The panellists all seemed to agree that the separation of monetary and
scal policies would not be tenable in the future. A new macro policy framework
was needed, in which monetary and scal policies worked together and were
combined with macroprudential, structural and, perhaps, incomes policies to
achieve sustainable growth with macroeconomic and nancial stability.
Presentations by Lead Speaker and panellists
Lead Speaker: Hans-Helmut Kotz
1
This is an outstanding opportunity because the topic of the panel is relevant
not only for the euro area but also for beyond, including the United States. In
my presentation, I would like to touch upon three points.
First, this talk would have lasted two seconds in 2007. At that time, there was
no debate on this issue because there was no issue of monetary and scal
policy mix. The roles of the two policies were completely separated. The
canonical pre-crisis view was that there was a clear assignment of tasks, clear
responsibilities and no reason to coordinate. The question then is why we
have changed our views so signicantly between August 2007 and now. The
second point that I would like to highlight is what is dierent now, in terms of
monetary policymaking, for conducting central bank policy in a scally stressed
environment. The third point is what this means for the European Monetary
Union (EMU) and why EMU is such a complicated environment for this issue.
1 Co-authored with Günter W. Beck, University of Siegen and SAFE Policy Center, Goethe Universität, Frankfurt.
88 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Reassessment of macro policy options
Coordination of monetary and scal policies (which used to be called the “two
macro handmaidens”) fell by the wayside as an issue of policy debates in the
early 1980s.
2
Over time, a view became dominant that a clear-cut division of
labour between domains of policymaking should prevail. More precisely, given
that there was no long-run trade-o between wage ination and employment,
monetary policy should focus on underwriting the stability of purchasing
power. Fiscal policy was about the provision of public goods and had a purely
allocation function, whilst simultaneously honouring the intertemporal public-
sector budget constraint. In this framework, the level of employment was
largely seen as the upshot of the workings of the labour market.
These policy approaches reected theoretical developments – the Monetarist
revolution (including the expectations-augmented Phillips curve) as well as
the policy-ineectiveness proposition (as it arose in a rational-expectations
model with instantaneous market clearing), largely of the 1960s and 1970s.
From there, as a logical corollary, a coherent policymaking setup was derived:
central banks had a mandate with a primary objective – namely, providing for
a low level of ination. Monetary policy was optimised by taking scal policy
and wage policy as given. No need for coordination; everyone was supposed
to do their homework.
This canonical view has been reassessed in the wake of the global nancial
crisis. With monetary policy limited by the zero lower bound of nominal
interest rates, the burden of macro-stabilisation (reducing the output gap)
could not be carried by central banks alone. Meanwhile, in a number of cases,
scal policies ran up against liquidity and solvency constraints. Some countries
were deemed by markets to be on an unsustainable scal path. Solvency was
threatened. Apparently, there was even no room for letting automatic stabilisers
do their work, let alone deploying discretionary scal impulses to bring output
closer to trend. In fact, some believed that this was a non-issue, claiming that
there was (and is) no output gap at all. It is all about misallocated resources,
an uncompetitive supply side (that is, overcapacities). Moreover, monetary
policy is substantially more complicated in Europe’s monetary union, with its
centralised monetary authority and multitude (19) of scal policies, operated
on a decentralised level and coordinated by a set of rules (the Stability and
Growth Pact, the Fiscal Compact, etc.).
2 See Blinder, A. (1982), “Issues in the Coordination of Monetary and Fiscal Policy”, in Monetary Policy Issues in the
1980s, Kansas City, MO: Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, pp. 3–34.
Panel 3: Conducting monetary policy when scal space is limited
89
In this presentation, we will briey sketch the canonical view (that prevailed
up to the global nancial crisis) on the appropriate mix between scal and
monetary policy and then highlight questions as they arose in the wake of the
crisis, leading to a sudden (positive) reappraisal of macro policy instruments.
This also meant the re-emergence of the old perspective on the coordination
issue between monetary and scal authorities. More particularly, with monetary
policy restricted by the zero lower bound, scal policies were supposed to
use scal space, given that it existed. Again, these issues are obviously more
complicated in the case of the euro area, given its substantial divergence in
the set-up and shape of national scal policies.
Policy objectives, mandates and interaction between scal and
monetary policies
Monetary policy: The price norm
For a quarter of a century now, modern monetary policy has been understood
as ination targeting, pursuing a price norm of about 2%. In the consensus
view, it was the task of the independent monetary authority to engineer an
output gap that credibly delivered on this promise. Monetary policy reaction
functions (Taylor rules) concisely captured this approach.
Fiscal policy: Debt sustainability
At the same time, scal policy was supposed to deliver scal sustainability,
honouring the inter-temporal budget constraint – that is, preventing unstable
dynamics from arising. The net present value of ordinary public sector revenues
had to be at least as large as the present value of expenditures.
The time path of the debt to GDP ratio (Δb) can be usefully understood as
reecting the evolution of four factors:
3
Δb = d + (r − g)b
where d is the primary (non-interest) decit as ratio to GDP; r is the real interest
rate on government debt; g is the growth rate of GDP (i.e., the tax base); and
b is the existing ratio of outstanding public debt to GDP.
As is also well known, the debt-to-GDP ratio rises without bounds with a
primary decit and a positive wedge between the real interest rate and the
growth rate of the tax base (i.e., r > g).
4
Another untenable constellation would
3 See, for example, Tobin, J. (1984), “The Monetary Fiscal Policy Mix in the United States”, in P. Jackson (ed.), Policies
for Prosperity. Essays in a Keynesian Mode. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, pp. 142–167.
4 Often, to separate out the ination eect, this condition is also expressed in nominal terms as R > g+π, with R as the
nominal interest rate, and g and π standing for the growth rate of nominal GDP.
90 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
be the same positive wedge (r > g) with a primary surplus, but insucient to
counterbalance the high starting level of debt (b). Japan, for example, needs a
high primary surplus (in the non-interest part of the budget) only to stabilise
its very high debt ratio, very low funding costs notwithstanding. It suers from
a large volume of outstanding debt relative to GDP and a very low growth
rate of nominal GDP.
This is, of course, only arithmetic or accounting, but it emphasises that we have
to acknowledge all four “parameters” when thinking about the trajectory of
government debt.
5
It is also remarkable that over the last century, only about a
third of the increase (or the fall) in the debt-to-GDP ratio was “due” to primary
decits (surpluses).
6
The rest was accounted for by the constellation of growth,
nominal interest rates and ination. In other words, the link between decits
and debt is less pronounced than is often believed.
This is where a short-term coordination issue between monetary and scal
policy arises, in terms of how to underwrite a sucient utilisation of resources
(a small output gap). This short-term macro-stabilisation issue has been at
the core of the original debate about the structural interdependence between
monetary and scal policy.
However, what about long-term sustainability? The inter-temporal government
budget constraint requires that in the long run, the present value of future
surpluses can absorb (i.e., is equal to) today’s debt. Alas, this transversality
condition is very vague indeed. Woodford, for example, has strong reservations
over whether it is appropriate to conceive of the government as optimising
“subject to given market prices and a given budget constraint.... For the
government is a large agent, whose actions can certainly change equilibrium
prices and an optimizing government surely should take account of this in
choosing its actions” (p. 693).
7
An indication of this analytical lacuna is the inability to come up with an
optimal level of public debt
8
or a threshold beyond which debt becomes
uncontrollable. This also means that scal space – the distance to distress – is
a rather imprecise concept.
9
The debt-sustainability frontier is to a large degree
5 We put parameters in quotation marks since they are clearly not simply givens, exogenously determined. Macro
policies, for example, could have an impact on the output gap. Structural policies could raise trend growth.
6 See, Abbas, A.N.B., El-Ganainy, A. and Horton, M. (2011), “Historical Patterns and Dynamics of Public Debt:
Evidence from a New Data Base”, IMF Economic Review 59(4): 717–742.
7 Woodford, M. (2001), “Fiscal Requirements for Price Stability”, Journal of Money, Credit, and Banking 33(3): 669–728.
8 See, for example, Villieu, P. (2011), “Quel objectif pour la dette publique à moyen terme?”, Revue d’Économie Financière
3(103): 79–98.
9 The concept has been developed, in particular, by IMF economists; see Ostry, J., Ghosh, A. and Espinoza, R. (2015),
“When Should Public Debt Be Reduced?”, IMF Sta Discussion Note SDN/15/10, June.
Panel 3: Conducting monetary policy when scal space is limited
91
dened by a vector of political forces – the acceptability of a programme to
generate the required primary surplus, through tax hikes and/or expenditures
cuts.
Unsustainability (i.e., not meeting the solvency constraint) or the perceived
capacity to roll over debt appears to lie in the eye of the beholder. It is here
that the ECB’s Outright Monetary Transactions (OMT) programme of the
summer of 2012, with its spread-dampening eect, comes in.
Perspectives on monetary policy in a stressed scal environment
The short run
Macro-stabilisation works through what James Tobin called a “common
funnel”. Tobin was, of course, referring to aggregate demand. Monetary
policy bears on aggregate spending via its eects on interest rates and interest-
sensitive expenditures. Fiscal policy impacts aggregate demand via taxation
and spending decisions. It is ultimately the total size of the monetary and scal
policy package that counts.
10
In this light, monetary and scal policy are not really separate tools;
11
there is
an inherent, inevitable interdependence with regard to output stabilisation or
smoothing of the cycle.
12
This leads to the issue of coordination: in the wake
of the global nancial crisis, pulling away budgetary policy from stress territory
and, at the same time, preventing scal trouble from derailing monetary policy.
But then, even if the desire to cooperate exists, coordination amounts to an
intricate challenge, for the following reasons: dierent objectives, dierent
preferences (time horizons) and dierent assessments (models).
This makes the implementation of consistent policies dicult and seemingly
speaks for “clear separation” and “rule-based” policies. The central bank
minimises a loss function (dened in output and ination deviations) by
operating a monetary policy (Taylor) rule with the Phillips curve (the supply
side) as a constraint. Also, in view of substantial diculties – in particular,
lags – in scal policy implementation, monetary policy was seen as by far more
exible to respond to macro-stabilisation issues.
10 The monetary-scal policy mix was seen as an instrument to inuence output composition (between consumption
and capital expenditures). A tight money, expansionary scal policy mix (à la Reagan-Volcker), leading to higher
ination-adjusted interest rates, was deemed to reduce capital expenditures and, hence, to slow down growth.
11 See Tobin, J. (1982), “Money and Finance in the Macroeconomic Process”, Journal of Money, Credit and Banking 14(2):
171–204; and Tobin, J. (1984), op. cit.
12 This is, of course, acknowledged by monetary theorists. Carl Walsh, for example, writes about the recognition that
“scal and monetary policies are linked through the government sector’s budget constraint”; see Walsh, C. (2010),
Monetary Theory and Policy, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, p. 135.
92 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
The long run
Fiscal policy was supposed to meet the debt sustainability condition – i.e.,
meet the solvency constraint – by generating a primary surplus which could
compensate for a potential wedge between interest rates and growth. In other
words, the sustainability of a budgetary course with a constant debt ratio
requires
b ≤
d
(r - g)
to hold. That is, in the long run the existing debt-to-GDP ratio has to be
smaller than the primary surplus divided by the wedge between interest rates
and growth.
Here, seemingly, monetary policy was in no way involved; it simply had to
deliver on its ination objective. In other words, the monetary nancing
option appeared to be barred. But, as Sargent and Wallace have stressed, it
is ultimately the consolidated government budget constraint which must be
honoured.
13
Therefore, given dynamically unsustainable debt positions, scal
policy can force monetary policy’s hand. The intertemporal budget constraint
implies a binding limit for a price-stability-oriented central bank.
EMU’s Stability and Growth Pact acknowledged this interdependence
between monetary and scal policy.
14
It was conceived to protect the central
bank against consequences as they potentially arise from unsustainable scal
policies. Hence, the ECB’s independence was not deemed to be a sucient
condition for providing price stability. Nor was bond markets’ capacity to
rein in sovereigns with a strong decit bias (through higher risk premia). This
could be understood as an institutional response to the “unpleasant monetarist
arithmetic” – establishing that central banks ultimately are resigned to giving
in when scal policy embarks on an unsustainable course.
15
13 Sargent, T.J. and Wallace, N. (1981), “Some Unpleasant Monetarist Arithmetic”, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis
Quarterly Review 5(3).
14 See Canzoneri, M.B., Cumby, R.E. and Diba, B.T. (2002), “Should the European Central Bank and the Federal
Reserve Be Concerned about Fiscal Policy?”, in Rethinking stabilization policy: A symposium, Kansas City, MO: Federal
Reserve Bank of Kansas City, pp. 333–389.
15 The scal theory of the price level, starting from the observation that modern central banks control short-term
interest rates (and not the money supply), argues that in the long run it is scal policy which pins down the path of
the price level; see Woodford (2001), op. cit.. But this is, as Alan Blinder insists, a very long run or an “innite run”
that does not impose “any serious constraints” on actual politics; see Blinder (1982), op. cit.
Panel 3: Conducting monetary policy when scal space is limited
93
The global nancial crisis, the euro crisis and a reassessment of
the monetary–scal policy mix
The global nancial crisis ushered in a substantial reassessment. Faced with
a dramatic fall in output, a corresponding rise in unemployment (except for
the case of Germany) and central banks that were compelled to become
highly unconventional (when reaching the eective lower bound), not only
were automatic stabilisers left to do their work but also discretionary scal
policy was rehabilitated. This came with a swift and very large increase in
the level of public debt (see Figure 1). Interest rates on government bonds,
however, continued their long-term downward trend, except for the case of
peripheral euro area economies (see Figure 2). In the latter cases, liquidity
as well as solvency issues implied at times a substantial widening of spreads
against safe assets. The threat of a euro area break-up (euphemistically dubbed
“redenomination risk”) called for a compensation.
Figure 1: Debt as a ratio to GDP (%)
40
60
80
100
120
140
160
180
200
2000
Germany
France
Italy
Spain
Greece
USA
2002 2004 2006 2008 2010 2012 2014 2016 2018
Source: OECD.
94 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Figure 2: Government bond yields (%)
0
4
8
1
2
1
6
20
1960
1965 1970 1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010 2015
France
Germany
Italy
Spain
USA
Source: FRED, Federal Reserve of St. Louis.
Overall, the global nancial crisis has demonstrated that:
• price stability did not provide (simultaneously) for nancial stability;
• debt positions can become vulnerable and untenable – and rather suddenly
so (e.g., Ireland and Spain) – with purported scal space becoming a
chimera; this holds particularly true for sub-sovereigns (i.e., member states
of monetary unions); and
• sovereign risk premia are evidently related to the access (or not) to lender-
of-last-resort or backstop facilities (e.g., Spain versus the United Kingdom).
16
The very substantial scal and monetary response to the global nancial crisis
– large increases in decits and debt, substantial expansion of central bank
balance sheets – at the same time did not lead to a commensurate increase
of interest rates, risk premiums or ination, at least not in the United States
or EMU’s core.
16 See De Grauwe, P. and Yuemei, J. (2013), “From Panic-Driven Austerity to Symmetric Macroeconomic Policies in
the Eurozone”, Journal of Common Market Studies (51): 31–41.
Panel 3: Conducting monetary policy when scal space is limited
95
In any case, there appears to be a Tobin-type “common funnel” also in the
long run. Monetary policy cannot deliver without a sustainable scal policy.
17
However, this was still a world where banks – or non-bank banks (i.e., banks’
functional substitutes) – did not matter. In a number of cases during the global
nancial crisis, however, it was the banking sector and private-debt instability
eroding a presumed scal space extremely rapidly (think of Ireland or Spain).
This has to be accounted for in policymaking going forward. The euro area’s
Macroeconomic Imbalance Procedure (for sure, delicate and complicated) is
a rst attempt at addressing these issues.
Cooperative monetary policy: Is it feasible…
Debt-to-GDP ratios (in cross-country, longitudinal analyses) have a statistically,
but not so much economically, signicant impact on long-term interest rates.
Also, in a number of studies, thresholds with substantial condence bands
show up.
18
In panel analyses, those non-linearities come largely from EMU
member countries, possibly capturing a break-up and ultimately an ination
risk (in a new, devalued currency).
19
Fiscal stress does impact monetary policy.
20
Monetary policy could be forced
to accommodate an inevitable adjustment to a more sustainable position.
Or, it might become subject to the dominance of scal policy. But, it cannot
disentangle itself from this inescapable interdependence.
Accommodative monetary policy, however, might reduce incentives to adjust
budgetary trajectories to a sustainable path. Fiscal policy might stay longer on
an ultimately untenable course, eventually wreaking havoc with the ination
objective. While this moral hazard story is plausible, empirically, monetary
support was a necessary condition of scal consolidation.
With scal policy embarked on an unsustainable path, there is not much
that monetary policy could achieve. Fiscal dominance prevails. In Europe,
in a number of cases, it would be more appropriate to read things through a
lens of nancial dominance. Fiscal policy, despite having the space in at least
17 Woodford (2001, op. cit.) has an epigraph of Karl Brunner’s: “Proposals for a monetary rule require a supplementary
proposal of a scal rule”.
18 See, for example, Cechetti, S., Mohanty, M.S. and Zampoli, F. (2010), “The Future of Public Debt: Prospects and
Implications”, Bank for International Settlements Working Paper No. 300, Basel; and Reinhart, C., Reinhart, V. and
Rogo, K. (2012), “Debt overhangs: Past and Present”, NBER Working Paper No. 18015, Cambridge, MA.
19 Greenlaw, D., Hamilton, J., Hooper, P. and Mishkin, F. (2013), “Crunch Time: Fiscal Crises and the Role of Monetary
Policy”, NBER Working Paper 19297, Cambridge, MA. Employing updated long-term interest-rate and government
debt data for euro area economies, we ran panel xed-eects regressions in the spirit of Greenlaw et al. (2013). Our
results conrm their ndings - they are largely driven by observations from euro area peripheral economies.
20 Greenlaw et al. (2013), op. cit.
96 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
some member states, let the ECB take care of a number of fragile banks.
Clearly, monetary policy can only buy time, not deliver a solution to Europe’s
overcapacity in banking.
More specically, against the background of unconventional monetary policy,
large-scale asset purchase programmes should also lead to substantial losses
on the central bank’s balance sheet when rates ultimately rise, mechanically
increasing with the duration of assets bought. Although, what concerns the
ECB is that this could mean a substantial shock to its capital buer, the duration
of assets acquired being signicantly lower than in the case of the Federal
Reserve. While central banks can do without equity for a while and up to a
limit, their political and budgetary independence would evidently suer.
… and what is the dierence in Europe’s EMU?
EMU member states are sub-sovereigns. They oat their bonds in a currency
over which they have no agency. The ECB is prohibited by the European
Treaties from acting as a lender of last resort to EMU governments. Therefore,
liquidity risk premia (not unlike uninsured roll-over risk for bank debt) have
become so pertinent in the EMU. That is also what gave its clout to the
announcement of conditional Outright Monetary Transactions in the summer
of 2012. At the same time, OMT is the best that EMU member states in fragile
scal positions can hope for.
Hence, EMU member countries with barely any scal space to show for
cannot rely on “their” central bank – the ECB is supra-national, or stateless.
Relief could only come from partner countries using their capacity to reduce
output gaps (cushion the shock), restructuring (with its inevitable repercussions
on vulnerable nancial institutions) or a mutualisation of sovereign risks
(Eurobonds). The latter option seems to be far “out of money”.
In view of a prevalent decit bias – especially in polities with proportional
representation and, hence, frequent coalition governments – scal rules to
control debt as well as focusing on structural, cyclically corrected decits
(i.e., letting automatic stabilisers do their work) make sense.
21
However, given
the high variance in output gaps across EMU member states, automatic
stabilisers sometimes might need some substantial discretionary support, as
the global nancial crisis has demonstrated. This is infeasible under the current
institutional features of the EMU. The SGP is prone to being procyclical at
the country level. The recently installed European Fiscal Board might be
tasked with assessing the appropriateness and need for a discretionary stance.
21 See Alesina, A. and Perotti, R. (1995), “The Political Economy of Budget Decits”, IMF Sta Papers 42(1): 1–31.
Panel 3: Conducting monetary policy when scal space is limited
97
Going forward, a number of questions and open issues have to be addressed.
Monetary and scal policy actions are inextricably linked, in the short as well
as the long run. In the wake of the global nancial crisis, both responded to
nancial instability. How should policy account for this “omitted” (crucial)
variable? With scal space gone, are there any options left for monetary policy?
Can we get back to the pre-crisis, Great Moderation environment? Or do
we have to reconsider in the new world (with non-standard monetary policy
interventions and an enlarged set of tasks) the assignment of stabilisation
tasks and ways to coordinate these (rule-oriented or situation-dependent,
discretionary)? What makes the euro area dierent? Can the United States
be a blueprint?
Banking union, for example, is an attempt to respond to the inexorable link
between money and credit.
22
But, of course, the link between euro area sub-
sovereigns and their national banks has not been severed. Moreover, this is
a potentially large source of scal instability. In the case of a systemic crisis,
the bail-in option will not be available. Unfortunately, however, banking crises
are typically systemic. In redesigning its nancial regulatory system after the
global nancial crisis, the United States has not opted for a bail-in approach.
It, of course, has a federal backstop.
Panellist 1: Ardo Hansson
The focus of this session links back to monetary policy, but we cannot get away
from what we discussed during the sessions yesterday. Just to start, I would say
that an accommodative monetary policy stance in the euro area is warranted
now simply because ination is below target and we have a very clear mandate.
That is not very controversial. Ination is driven signicantly, although not
entirely, by commodity prices. Sometimes we forget how substantial this
commodity price shock was. We usually look at oil prices. However, if we look
more broadly and include metals, food prices, construction material prices and
so on, they are probably 50% down in three years, and commodities are in
all kinds of goods and services that we consume. It was quite a serious shock.
Yesterday, we talked about the diculty of measuring the output gap and that
it is probably closing now. If we look at unemployment rates, they are slowly
coming down. So, the output gap is probably closing, and that is good news.
It probably shows that at the margin, things are beginning to work. Looking
forward, we have to keep our expectations somewhat realistic.
22 See Kotz, H.-H. (2017), “Monetary union, banking union: Money and credit, inexorably linked”, in L. Papademos
(ed.), Banking Union and Monetary Policy, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press (forthcoming).
98 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Sometimes we get overly pessimistic about the cyclical positions. We refer
to the earlier period as the Great Moderation. But in many countries, it was
also a period of great excess, maybe not so much in the scal accounts but
certainly the nancial sectors, balance of payments, and so on were quite
out of balance in many countries. Looking back, and knowing what we now
know, we probably regret some of the things we did, but these now create our
current initial conditions and give us more headwind. Since the outbreak of
the crisis, to the extent that there was overleveraging before, it has subsequently
got even worse.
Moreover, measuring the output gap is tricky. This might also require a focus
on labour market indicators. We see this in some countries such as Slovakia
and the Baltic states, which admittedly do not account for a large share of the
euro area economy. When you simply look at the output gap in GDP terms,
it sees to be below potential. However, if you look at what is going on in the
labour market, it is quite dierent. You may say that the economy is overheated.
Thus, potential growth may not be as high as if you could lter it out from
the GDP growth series. In Estonia, we currently have GDP growth of about
1.5% but wage growth of around 6.5%. This is very tricky. Potential growth
might be even lower than we think. Getting ination back to a higher level is
important, but it is only a part of the challenge.
There is also a primitive mantra which says that those countries that have scal
space should use it. However, many of the countries that have scal space
tend to be operating near or above full employment, and they should not be
encouraged to drive their domestic economies even more out of balance. At
the same time, most of the countries which could do with some stimulus do
not have scal space. This was brought out in the presentation by Claudia
Braz yesterday, which showed only two or three countries in the EU that have
the potential to use scal space. This mantra is also incorrect in implying that
scal space should ideally be zero. In other words, if you have scal space, you
should use it up. In fact, you should build up a bit of scal space.
Yesterday, we also talked about the aggregate scal position of the euro area.
This is a concept that probably makes sense in the United States. However, if
we have over 95% of our public expenditure at national or sub-national levels,
this concept is quite policy irrelevant. Making a comparison, for example,
with this hotel: what is the average temperature in this hotel? It is dened
and measurable, but what does it mean if I aim for an average temperature
of 22 degrees, while it is currently 18 degrees? Someone comes in and says,
“since all of our thermostats are at maximum except the one in this conference
room, you people will have to bear 40 degrees because we need to get average
Panel 3: Conducting monetary policy when scal space is limited
99
temperature up”. You have to look country by country, because scal policy
in a monetary union should be targeted more at domestic challenges than it
might be otherwise.
Figure 1: General government lending and gross xed capital formation of
euro area countries, average 2011–2015 (% of GDP)
!
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%
&
'
("! () (' (% (# ! #
*+,-./0-+/
1-2343/
Source: AMECO, European Commission.
Figure 1 shows the correlation between public investment and decits in the
euro area. You can change the time period, you can try to dene it in structural
terms, but the basic point is that there does not seem to be any relationship.
If you think that creating space to run larger decits would make everyone
start undertaking public investments, this would probably not help. In the end,
this will dissipate in the consumption side and you could end up even worse
o – you have dissipated your scal space, but you have not permanently
channelled those expenditures into growth.
We should not only talk about what to do now, but also why we got into this
situation. Since that was most of yesterday’s discussion, I will only say that if you
have a monetary union, you need more scal space than otherwise. Turning to
what to do about monetary policy, it should remain broadly accommodative at
this point in time, but there are two qualiers. The rst is the need to maintain
a degree of patience because there are lot of special forces at play behind the
current low ination. We have had quite an unusual and severe commodity
shock, and the extent of leveraging – maybe overleveraging – is substantial. It
will not go away anytime soon. That does create some headwinds which will
100 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
naturally make the transition a bit longer. Some work done at the Bank for
International Settlements concludes much along the same lines. Second, you
can also choose the composition of monetary policy instruments which will
deliver a given broad stance, but do so more carefully. You can always think of
an instrument having an eect on ination, but also as having either positive
or negative spillover eects. By carefully considering all of these eects, you
can choose a mix to get the same impact on ination but with dierent side
eects on, for example, the behaviour of enterprises and the behaviour of
governments. Maybe you can deal more with moral hazard, issues on nancial
stability, and so on. It is like a doctor prescribing a medicine – of course, they
want you to get well, but there are many ways of getting well and you want
to make sure that there are as few negative side eects as possible.
With regard to scal policy, there is a composition question. On both the
revenue and expenditure sides, there is a lot of scope in many countries to
move to more growth-friendly mixes. Naturally, there is no mechanistic rule
that says once public debt rises above 90% or 80% or 60% of GDP, everything
automatically moves from sustainable to unsustainable. However, we are not
in a world of public debt at 30% of GDP, where we could have a discussion
about counter-cyclical policies. In many countries, there is more need to
restore scal space and maintain condence.
Panellist 2: Jozef Makúch
Let me begin my presentation with a question to which an answer is widely
sought: Is monetary policy facing a “new normal”, or is the current situation
merely a temporary phenomenon? This seminar provides an ideal setting in
which to explore the answer.
Monetary policy implementation remains challenging
In recent years, central bankers have been facing a number of serious and
unprecedented challenges. While nding ourselves in unchartered waters, we
must still steer a course that takes us to our objectives. The long-running
deviation from the ination target raises the questions of whether the target is
correct and whether the time is right for its reassessment. Some people argue
that an increase in the target could raise ination expectations, while others
say that reducing the target would be reective of a long-term low-ination
environment. In my view, such discussions are still at the academic level.
There needs to be research into whether ination-target adjustments in other
countries have had favourable and clear eects on expectations and on the
transmission of monetary policy to the economy as a whole.
Panel 3: Conducting monetary policy when scal space is limited
101
Ination is subdued despite monetary policy accommodation
Despite a continuous and substantial easing of monetary policy conditions,
the ination target is being missed, mainly owing to strengthening headwinds.
How is monetary policy supposed to outweigh sudden and unexpected shocks
in oil prices, especially when they involve a combination of demand and
supply shocks? As studies show, a supply shock should have a positive impact
on commodity-importing economies, and we see this most noticeably in the
ination rate. Is there a further pass-through to the wider economy, however,
that would stimulate the demand side? The answer here seems to be: not as
eectively as we would expect. The impact of sudden and unexpected oil price
shocks in an environment of prolonged high unemployment, slower growth
and very low ination (even turning into deation) may be putting downward
pressure on ination expectations.
What should the monetary policy response be?
I rmly agree with other speakers that monetary policy cannot deliver its full
potential in the absence of sustainable and responsible scal policy. But if that
ideal is not being practised, it may be asked whether monetary policy should, or
could, be still more aggressive? The scope for deploying standard instruments
is almost exhausted. We have even shown that interest rates are not zero-level
bound; they can be lower still and we are now testing how low they can go.
Looking closely at interest rates, it is clear and logical that monetary policy
transmission has a greater impact on lending activity than on deposit-taking
business. The resulting narrowing of margins has had a signicant, but still
manageable, negative impact on banking sector prots. If, however, further
easing of monetary policy is necessary, it will have to be conducted cautiously
so as not to bring about a totally counterproductive threat to nancial stability.
I myself do not see much room for manoeuvre here.
At a time when liquidity is excessive, bond yields and interest rates remain
at all-time lows and the ECB balance sheet is as large as it has ever been,
ination still remains muted. In what other ways could monetary policy be
accommodative? Recently, unconventional instruments were introduced on the
assumption that they were temporary, short-term measures, but the situation
has changed and we should therefore get used to a new normal in the monetary
policy arsenal. There is a role here, too, for the academic debate to explore
the potential for using other, new non-standard instruments as the need may
arise. The question is whether they will be as eective as earlier measures.
102 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
In the case of the euro area, there is no need at present to consider further
accommodation. The recent non-standard measures have not had sucient
time to do what they were intended to do.
No excuses for scal policy
The eectiveness of monetary policy is, as we have been taught, heavily
dependent on the environment in which it is implemented. While monetary
policy has tools to stimulate demand, it cannot inuence the performance of
the supply side of economy, which is crucial for sustainable growth. Although
the scope for scal policy is limited, we should not take that as a new normal.
We should not see scal policy as some kind of Sleeping Beauty. At the time
when monetary policy targets and the ECB mandate were being formulated,
it was assumed that responsible scal policy and the responses of product and
labour markets to imbalances would be suciently strong and exible to prevent
extended deviation from the equilibrium. As it turned out, that assumption was
not universally valid. Since scal policy was not always conducted responsibly
in the good times, it has been unable to aid monetary policy in the bad times
by easing conditions and supporting economic growth. But despite the lack
of scal leeway, it is incumbent on governments not only to consolidate public
nances, but through reforms, to lay the ground for stimulating the supply side
of economic growth. In the short term, governments must assume growth-
friendly consolidation by making eciency savings in those areas of the public
sector where the potential for productivity gains is signicant.
Panellist 3: Boris Vujčić
23
I took the task of reecting on the conduct of monetary policy in a limited
scal space situation very seriously. First, I will examine how much scal space
exists and then look at the possibilities for monetary policy – not only for pure
monetary policy but also for macroprudential policy, which I believe is very
important and has been often overlooked. In the latter context, I will shed
light on the implementation of counter-cyclical monetary policy in Croatia.
Fiscal space and cyclicality of scal policy in the EU
Expectations as to what monetary policy can achieve in Europe have risen
over the course of the crisis. Demands that it should go beyond its principal
mandate of price (and nancial) stability and try to support economic recovery
more directly have come from both politicians and the general public. What
23 I would like to thank Josip Funda, Igor Ljubaj and Alan Bobetko for their valuable contributions.
Panel 3: Conducting monetary policy when scal space is limited
103
has led to such developments, especially when we know that it is scal policy
that can have a more direct and faster eect on the real economy? You build
a road, your investments go up, maybe you will create some multiplier eects,
your GDP increases – it seems quite simple. So, why would you go in for all
these complicated LTROs, OMTs, QEs, etc.? The answer to this question lies
in problems of debt sustainability for all sectors of the economy, including the
government, which has substantially narrowed the scal space (see Figures 1
and 2), while structural reforms take time to deliver tangible results.
This lack of scal space in most European economies can be largely attributed
to the lack of prudent scal policies in good times (before the crisis erupted
and escalated), when most countries were running high structural decits
and procyclical scal policies. However, somewhat in their defence, at that
time most countries were not fully aware of the magnitude of structural scal
imbalances, as potential GDP levels were perceived to be higher than they
are now estimated to have been for the same period. Ex post assessment of
structural balances by the European Commission for 2007 for almost all EU
countries are less favourable than estimates presented in the Commission’s
Autumn 2008 forecast.
24
There are many denitions of scal space. For example, the IMF denes it
as the scope that policymakers have to calibrate the pace of scal adjustment
without undermining scal sustainability. In other words, short-run room for
manoeuvre must always be weighed against the objective of scal sustainability
over the medium to long run. However, with a scal framework that contains
relatively strict rules, it is the rules-dened scal space that matters and we can
forget about debt limits and other, more theoretical approaches. So, to put it
simply, the dierence between a country’s structural balance and its Medium-
Term Objective (MTO) is the measure for scal space in the EU.
24 http://ec.europa.eu/economy_nance/publications/pages/publication13290_en.pdf
104 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Figure 1: Fiscal space in 2007
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Note: A positive dierence between the structural balance and the country-specic Medium-Term
Objective (MTO) is a simple measure of scal space. Currently, the European Commission
provides only a cyclically adjusted budget balance for 2007. In order to estimate the structural
balance for 2007 based on current assessment of potential GDP, we have assumed that the one-
o measures provided in the European Commission’s Autumn 2008 forecast have not changed.
Source: European Commission.
Panel 3: Conducting monetary policy when scal space is limited
105
As the European scal framework was less strict at the beginning of the crisis,
even without scal space, countries did try to stimulate their economies and a
package of stimulus measures was also prepared at the EU level in 2009 and
2010. However, the escalation of the sovereign debt crisis in the euro area put
scal policy into urgency mode, with the ultimate objective of bringing debt
levels back to sustainable paths. So, procyclical scal tightening dominated in
the EU in the 2011–2013 period (Figure 3).
Figure 3: Cyclicality of scal policy in the European Union
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Number of countries
8ounter-cyclical loosening Counter-cyclical tightening
>rocyclical tightening
>rocyclical loosening
?eutral policy
Source: Ameco database.
Croatia’s scal policy was procyclical both before and after the onset of nancial
crisis. Fiscal policy procyclicality is well known in the literature and, although
there is no unanimity among economists about the optimal cyclical behaviour
of scal policy, there is broad consensus that procyclical policies should be
avoided as they add to macroeconomic instability. From a Keynesian point
of view, that is, a procyclical scal policy amplies uctuations in real output,
thereby leading to prolonged recessions in bad times. From a neoclassical point
106 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
of view, a procyclical scal policy is in conict with the consumption- and
tax-smoothing principles, which prescribe that government spending and tax
rates should remain unaected by business cycle uctuations.
25
Figure 4: Cyclicality of scal policy in Croatia
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A:<=:<31/=
B>C565745/73
<41.<20401
B>C565745/73
7CC;20401
-C:0<2>565745/73
<41.<20401
-C:0<2>565745/73
7CC;20401
Sources: CBS and CNB.
Nevertheless, procyclical scal policies were, and still are, a Croatian reality.
During 2003–2008, the Croatian economy was seemingly doing well and
real GDP was above its potential level while, at the same time, the structural
primary decit deteriorated, which had a procyclical eect on economic
activity. Only in 2005 was there an adjustment of the underlying primary
balance, leading to a counter-cyclical scal policy. The lack of scal space also
led to procyclical scal behaviour in the crisis period. The scal adjustment
was especially notable in 2015, when the cyclically adjusted primary balance
improved by almost 2.0% of GDP. For the sake of clarity, what is relevant
25 See Andersen, L.A., and Nielsen, L.H.W. (2008), “Fiscal Transparency and Procyclical Fiscal Policy”, University
of Copenhagen (available at http://web.econ.ku.dk/epru/Fiscal%20Transparency%20and%20Procyclical%20
Fiscal%20Policy%20_jan%2008_.pdf).
Panel 3: Conducting monetary policy when scal space is limited
107
here is whether the amount of resources that the government is placing in the
economy is increasing or decreasing, which is dierent from a simple change
in the government decit.
However, Croatia is not an exception in such behaviour. On the contrary, a
procyclicality bias can be observed in many other EU countries. This was
especially the case before the crisis (the good times), and after the onset of the
sovereign debt crisis (the bad times), as already shown in Figure 3. Looking at
Central and Eastern European (CEE) countries only, some did have a counter-
cyclical stance in dierent years. But if you look at a GDP-weighted average
of the scal stance, again you get the fact that scal policies were actually in
the wrong place before and after the crisis, basically acting procyclically rather
than counter-cyclically (Figure 5).
Figure 5: Cyclicality of scal policy in CEE EU member states
!""#
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+A9.:0<343523-51B273-5115AA70.2./
@<A343523-51B273-5115AA70.2./
Note: Output gap and change in cyclically adjusted primary balance are computed as GDP-
weighted averages of CEE EU member states. The impact of government assistance to the
nancial sector is excluded from the calculation of the cyclically adjusted primary balance.
Source: AMECO database.
108 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Such a policy orientation has led to a gradual public debt stabilisation in the
EU after a strong surge in debt-to-GDP ratios during 2009–2010. In 2015,
public debt in the EU28 declined from the previous year. However, it was still
almost 25 percentage points of GDP higher than in 2008. Notwithstanding
the increase in the debt-to-GDP ratio, interest payments in the EU decreased
somewhat due to a decline in borrowing costs. However, as the debt level
remains high in many countries, the heavy burden of interest payments weighs
on the ability of scal policy to stimulate the economy. Here, Croatia stands
out as a country with one of the largest increases in the debt-to-GDP ratio and
one of the highest interest payments-to-GDP ratios in the EU, having almost
doubled in the past seven years. This makes the budget quite sensitive to interest
rate shocks, and therefore the contractionary scal policy will probably have
to continue for a while (Figures 6 and 7).
Figure 6: General government debt, 2015
!
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72.3-(8-
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>6,1;8-
PK1QK'N0
Source: Ameco database.
Panel 3: Conducting monetary policy when scal space is limited
109
Figure 7: Interest payments, 2015
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Source: Ameco database.
Counter-cyclical monetary policy in Croatia
The Croatian National Bank (CNB) has maintained a counter-cyclical
monetary policy stance since well before the start of the crisis. In the pre-crisis
period, this entailed maintaining a large part of credit institutions’ assets as
a regulatory buer to curb what was perceived by the CNB as an excessive
and unsustainable credit growth. These measures proved to be very benecial
in giving some independence in monetary policymaking. Credit growth was
heavily taxed, and banks were asked to have a lot of foreign exchange liquidity.
Measures involved strong penalisation of abundant capital inows in the
banking sector, while capital requirements were linked to foreign exchange
lending to the borrowers who were not hedged. This forward-looking policy
stance enabled the CNB to release large amounts of foreign currency liquidity
following the onset of the crisis (Figure 8), while at the same time keeping the
banking system highly capitalised, stable and resistant to shocks. Therefore,
with the stubborn recession in Croatia, the monetary policy stance in recent
years has been highly accommodative and strongly oriented towards leaning
against the cycle (Figure 9).
110 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Figure 8: The Croatian National Bank’s monetary policy indicator
!"#
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)*+,-./012*345014+645.-*/
-478-,+4+711111111111111111113**9,+4+711111
Note: Monetary policy indicator = credit institutions’ assets required by regulation/total credit
institutions’ assets. Assets required by regulation (net of excess liquidity) include calculated
reserve requirement in Croatian kuna, allocated reserve requirement in foreign currency,
marginal reserve requirement, CNB bills and minimal foreign currency liquidity.
Source: CNB.
To conduct proper policy actions, awareness of the cyclicality is crucial. As in
the case of scal policy, if the macroprudential policy or prudential policy is
in the wrong place in one part of the cycle, it will surely be in the wrong place
in the other part of the cycle. This is what happened in many other countries
where prudential regulation and marginal regulation costs were increased
through the crisis. On the one hand, central banks had very expansionary
monetary policies, while on the other hand marginal regulation costs were
going up for the banks, osetting to some extent the monetary policy eects.
Leaning against the cycle in the case of Croatia was clearly counter-cyclical
(Figure 9).
Panel 3: Conducting monetary policy when scal space is limited
111
Figure 9: The Croatian National Bank’s leaning against the cycle: Monetary
policy stance and output gap
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C6?05=7+3A3>234>.>66D=0208
-76+3A3>234>.>66D=0208
Source: CNB.
Nowadays, the CNB is further boosting the already exceptionally high liquidity
of the monetary system, which in relative terms is several times higher than
in the euro area. In 2016, the CNB also introduced structural repo operations
through which it started providing liquidity with a four-year maturity, clearly
showing that the expansionary stance will be maintained for some time. This
led to an additional decrease in money market interest rates. The yield of
T-bills in Croatian kuna with a one-year maturity fell below 1% in March
2016, an historically low level (Figure 10). The overnight interbank interest
rate also recorded favourable developments, averaging 0.5% during the rst
quarter of 2016.
112 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Figure 10: Surplus liquidity and money market interest rates
!
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%
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"
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$
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Billion HRK
2
3iquidity surplus (incl. overnight deposits with the CNB) (right axis)
Ivernight interbank interest rate (left axis)
Interest rate on the 364-day T-bills (HRK) (left axis)
Source: CNB.
In line with monetary policy eorts, nancing conditions have been improving.
The average interest rate on short-term corporate loans fell from 7.5% in 2009
to 4.8% in March 2016, while the cost of long-term corporate loans decreased
by almost two percentage points in the same period (Figure 11). It should be
noted that due to emerged global and sovereign risks, a peak in interest rates
was recorded in 2009, even though the monetary counter-cyclical response to
the crisis was already substantial. Financing costs for households have generally
also been on a downward path.
26
Notwithstanding the monetary policy eorts, interest rates for rms and
households remain signicantly higher than in the euro area. Obviously,
their stronger downward adjustment is constrained by structural factors, most
notably the sovereign risk. In fact, the risk of default matters more now than
it did prior to the crisis. Although lending rates have generally fallen from
their pre-crisis levels, at the same time they have become more divergent
and dispersed, in line with the divergence of the perceived sovereign risks
26 The interest rates on housing loans jumped considerably in December 2015 because of the conversion of loans in
Swiss francs. The level of the renegotiated interest rates on converted loans was determined by a special law and,
for a signicant portion of those loans, it was higher than the market interest rate currently applicable to newly
approved housing loans indexed to the euro. In contrast, the average interest rates on the total of newly approved
long-term household loans (including housing loans) fell considerably as a result of the conversion, as the share of
newly approved housing loans in all long-term household loans rose sharply in the process of conversion and the
interest rates on those converted loans were, as a rule, much lower than those on non-housing long-term loans.
Panel 3: Conducting monetary policy when scal space is limited
113
(Figure 12). This suggests that there is still room for further lowering of interest
rates in Croatia, but the pace will depend on a number of factors that are
beyond the scope of domestic monetary policy, including macroeconomic
fundamentals and investor perceptions. Overall, nancing conditions are much
easier and interest rates are lower, but it matters even more how the country
is perceived on a risk-scale basis.
Figure 11: Domestic bank interest rates
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Long-term corporate loans
Long-term household loans
Housing loans
Other long-term household loans, excluding housing loans
Short-term corporate loans
Change of2
methodology
Note: Interest rates on new businesses calculated as a 6–month moving average.
Source: CNB.
On the other hand, this also points to potential spillover risks to local corporate
borrowing costs from global monetary policy tightening. In fact, a rise in
global interest rates would produce an automatic increase of the already
high sovereign debt burden through the “snowball eect”, and the growing
renancing costs of government would be passed on and mirrored in higher
interest rates for enterprises.
114 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Figure 12: Credit ratings and bank interest rates for short-term corporate
loans
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March 2016
Speculative grade
Investment grade
Worsening of the credit rating
Panel 3: Conducting monetary policy when scal space is limited
115
Note: Rating is expressed as average numerical value or rating grades by the three major rating
agencies (Fitch, Moody’s and Standard & Poor’s; for 2007 only Fitch). Numerical values
represent positive/negative distance from investment grade BBB–/Baa3. Rating ranges between
–9 and 9, where –9 represents the lowest speculative grade (C by Fitch and Moody’s, and R by
S&P), and 9 represents the best possible grade (AAA by Fitch and S&P and Aaa by Moody’s).
Lending rates refer to new lending to non–nancial corporations with maturity up to one year
amounting to up to €1 million.
Sources: ECB, Bloomberg and Fitch Ratings.
Concluding remarks
The need for scal adjustment leads to higher expectations of monetary policy.
This has not taken monetary policy beyond the mandate of central banks,
but pressure on them is certainly present. On the contrary, by supporting the
economy through historically low interest rates and unconventional policies,
central banks are exactly contributing to the fullment of the main objective.
However, they are running out of ammunition. Surprisingly, debates are now
emerging over whether expansionary scal policy should be used exceptionally
at the current juncture in order to support the closure of output gaps. This
points to a further need for coordination of dierent streams of economic
policy. Otherwise, as Gürkaynak and Davig have emphasised, trade-os for
central banks will be worsened and the incentives of other policymakers
distorted.
27
In the case of Croatia, with a monetary framework based on exchange rate
stability – which is the corner stone of ination expectations and of nancial
stability – degrees of freedom are reduced. Nevertheless, as a result of prudent
monetary policy before the crisis, the CNB has managed to provide ample
liquidity to the nancial sector and maintain nancial stability. However,
monetary policy can only buy time and lower the cost of structural reforms; it
cannot provide liquidity ad innitum. A key policy priority is to embark anew on
deep structural reforms that will increase the competitiveness of the domestic
economy and the eciency of the public sector.
27 Gürkaynak, R. and Davig, T. (2015), “Perils of central banks as policymakers of last resort”, VoxEU.org,
25 November (available at http://voxeu.org/article/central-bankers-policymakers-last-resort).
116 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Panellist 4: Gent Sejko
Before going into more detail on the topic of this panel, I would like to share
some thoughts with you regarding the coordination of monetary and scal
policies.
The price stability mandate of central banks and their operational independence
do not lessen the need for eective coordination between monetary and scal
policies. At a strategic level, the foremost objective of macroeconomic policy
is to achieve sustainable growth, in a context of price stability and a viable
external account.
This goal requires the contribution of both scal and the monetary policies,
within their respective domains, as well as a fair degree of coordination
amongst them.
On a macro scale, a balanced policy mix and an eective policy coordination
requires:
i. Policy sustainability: monetary and scal policies need to be on a sustainable
path. Prevailing academic consensus requires this sustainability to be
anchored in simple and eective policy rules, such as an ination-targeting
regime and some kind of scal sustainability law. Furthermore, sustainability
is mutually reinforcing: ination expectations can only be anchored if scal
policy does not raise destabilising fears while, at the same time, the scal
policy can be more sustainable if it is not burdened by excessively high
interest rates, fuelled by a not-so-credible monetary policy.
ii. Policy credibility: monetary and scal policies need to be credible. Policy
credibility arises from a combination of a clear and sustainable policy
framework, the right structure of incentives, as well as a positive track
record.
iii. Policy awareness: in other words, the recognition of dierent goals, dierent
transmission channels and dierent time frames, informing and constraining
monetary and scal policies.
In the long run, a balanced policy mix would minimise demand volatility,
enhance the allocation of resources and promote long-term growth. Eective
policy coordination would limit the scal decit to a level that can be nanced
via capital markets, without recourse to monetary nancing, without distorting
the allocation of resources, and without unsustainable external borrowing.
Eective policy coordination would also bind monetary policy towards
achieving its price stability mandate, thus reducing long-term risk premia
Panel 3: Conducting monetary policy when scal space is limited
117
and supporting nancial stability. As a corollary to all that I have mentioned,
a weak stance in one policy area burdens the other policy area with excessive
demands.
This brings me to the specic topic of this panel: conducting monetary policy
when scal space is limited.
The aftermath of the recent crisis left all economies in the region struggling
to reignite economic growth. Most of the countries are doing this while at
the same time facing the pressing need to consolidate their public nances.
Albania is no exception. Although the repercussions of the crisis were not so
severe, economic growth has almost halved compared to its pre-crisis trajectory.
Aggregate demand is unable to generate full employment of labour and capital,
while CPI ination has continuously undershot our target. In this economic
landscape, our monetary policy has taken an ever-more expansionary stance:
the policy rate (currently at 1.25%) is at an historical low, which would have
been unthinkable a few years ago; we have increased our liquidity injection
operations as well as expanded the range of acceptable collateral; and we have
also made use of conditional forward guidance as an alternative instrument
of monetary policy.
On the other hand, our public debt jumped from around 55% of GDP in 2008
to around 72% of GDP today, on account of the joint action of automatic
stabilisers and some degree of counter-cyclical scal stimulus. However, this
scal expansion was thought to be unsustainable, especially given the dicult
nancing conditions in international nancial markets. It was also thought to
be counterproductive, because of crowding-out concerns in the presence of
tight liquidity conditions in domestic nancial markets and because of negative
feedback loops through higher risk premia.
As a result, our scal policy is now locked on a consolidation path, aiming
to bring the public debt below 60% of GDP by the end of this decade. This
means that monetary policy remains the only counter-cyclical tool to stimulate
economic activity. Taking everything into account, I believe scal consolidation,
coupled with an expansionary monetary policy, delivers the correct policy mix
in the country.
However, given our experience so far, I would like to conclude my speech with
three observations:
i. Monetary policy remains eective even in the presence of scal consolidation.
In Albania, we have been able to steer interest rates into a downward
trajectory and to stimulate credit growth in domestic currency. However,
the eectiveness of monetary policy is hampered by scal contraction.
118 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
While the two policies moving in opposite directions would not be ideal
in the best of times, it is doubly undesirable in the presence of balance-
sheet adjustment in the private sector and heightened risk premia and
deleveraging in the nancial sector.
ii. Monetary policy can still achieve its goal of price stability in the presence
of scal consolidation. However, this statement needs to be qualied
further. From a longer-term perspective, ination remains a monetary
phenomenon. If a central bank is committed to its price stability mandate,
and given enough time for the monetary transmission mechanism to work,
there should be no reason why we should not be able to meet our ination
targets. However, there are two caveats here:
• In pursuit of its ination target, a central bank can, and might, be forced to engage
in unconventional monetary policy tools. This is very much the case when
central banks are irting with the limits of conventional instruments
of monetary policy (the zero lower bound of policy rates or extreme
risk aversion in the nancial system). As we know, unconventional tools
can both be distortionary and present us with the risks of unintended
consequences in terms of nancial stability. Under certain premises,
the risk associated with employing unconventional monetary policy
tools might be suciently strong to revisit the scope or the speed of
scal consolidation;
• A prolonged undershooting of the ination target might decouple ination expectations
from the ination target of central banks, requiring a more active monetary policy.
This is not an argument against the policy mix per se; rather, it is a
reminder of the crucial role that central bank communication and
management of expectations should have.
iii. We should avoid burdening monetary policy with too many goals or risk
losing our credibility. With public nances highly indebted, politicians have
been only too happy to place the burden of economic recovery on central
banks. As central bankers, we might enjoy this visibility, but we must be
cautious to not get carried away. We must always remind ourselves of
what monetary policy can and cannot achieve: we can ultimately aect
nominal variables in the economy (i.e., the price level), but we can aect
neither long-term growth nor general prosperity in the economy. To that
extent, I think we must always remind politicians to carry out their duties
on structural reforms and make best use of the breathing space provided
by monetary policy.
Panel 3: Conducting monetary policy when scal space is limited
119
Panellist 5: Vitas Vasiliauskas
This is the right place and the right time to discuss various issues related to
scal policy and monetary policy. Some of the issues of my presentation
were already touched upon in the previous panels. But, since I was taught at
university that repetitio est mater studiorum, I believe that repetition will be helpful
in our case as well. Let me start by framing these issues and conclude with a
couple of directions that I think should guide the solutions.
The euro area has to deal with the worst of both worlds: weak potential
growth and a cyclical recovery. After the global nancial crisis, a number
of structural issues emerged in many states. High structural unemployment,
lack of competitiveness, inecient judicial procedures and the burden of
non-performing loans (NPLs) – countries are dealing with these with varying
degrees of success. These are dicult issues due to their short-term costs. But,
from the perspective of long-term growth it is imperative that these reforms
are continued and that, in most cases, the progress should be faster.
At the same time – and this is an issue for today’s discussion – the cyclical
recovery, and especially domestic demand, is very fragile. The incentives to
consume and to invest are still rather weak. It will take a while before the
views of consumers and businesses independently converge. A push “from
outside” is needed.
Let me back this up with some facts.
First, euro area domestic demand is continuing to grow too slowly, and has
been doing so for too long. If we look at the cumulative percentage change
since the peak in 2008 – the green bars in Figure 1 – it is still negative. The
traditional measure of the cyclical position – the output gap (the red diamonds
in the gure) – shows broadly the same picture. Seven years have passed, but
a number of member states are still producing below their potential.
Second, the aggregate euro area indicator masks large variations between
cyclical positions of member states. Some countries are well into the recovery
stage, while many others still have sizeable output gaps.
120 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Figure 1: Domestic demand and output gaps
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Source: European Commission, Eurostat.
How can episodes like this be prevented?
The institutional design in the euro area foresees the role of business cycle
stabilisation for monetary policy. The role of scal policy is seen as automatic
and as stabilising the economies in response to (mostly small) non-systemic
asymmetric shocks. Gaps in this design emerge when a number of economies
are subject to negative shocks that are suciently large to aect the whole
region. The current situation is a good illustration of that.
To oset shocks of this magnitude, the desirable eect can be achieved by
a combined policy response. The Eurosystem’s accommodative monetary
policy has been gradually reinforced through several packages since 2014.
We observe that monetary accommodation has improved condence and
nancial conditions. The ECB’s focused communication and the commitment
to monetary easing until ination returns to the long-term target has prevented
deationary environment.
Let me now turn to scal policy. Debt levels, which are above the Maastricht
criterion of 60% of GDP in a majority of the member states, highlight
sustainability concerns. Meanwhile, large negative output gaps indicate the
need for stabilisation policies.
So how can we nd the right balance between the economic stabilisation and
debt sustainability objectives of scal policy? My rst direction is a credible
scal framework. In recessions, despite a counter-cyclical scal policy stance,
credible long-term scal commitments should be able to convince markets
Panel 3: Conducting monetary policy when scal space is limited
121
of the determination of member states to steer their debt ratios towards
the Maastricht rule. It would then be possible to create some scal space
in the short term which would help to put more emphasis on the economic
stabilisation objective.
The current scal framework, de jure, foresees some of these principles. De
facto, the picture is far from this. With strong emphasis on sustainability of
public nances but without real corrective action, member states are losing
condence and credibility in bond markets. As a result, countries have to bear
negative consequences without proper gains from the real structural changes
in public nances.
Let us have a look at some evidence.
While dealing with the recent economic challenges, the EU has proved its
ability to take on ambitious commitments. But, at this stage, the most important
thing is the ability to deliver what was agreed. Just to illustrate: at the moment,
according to the European Commission’s assessment of the draft budgetary
plans for 2016, only four EU member states fully comply with the provisions of
the Stability and Growth Pact. Moreover, none of the EU states fully addressed
any out of 102 country-specic recommendations for 2015/2016. More than
90% of all reform recommendations were implemented only with limited or
some progress (Figure 2).
Figure 2: Progress on implementation of country-specic recommendations,
2015–2016
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122 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Why is the EU’s track record in complying with the agreed rules so poor?
More importantly, how can that be changed?
We need strong political will to enforce what we jointly agreed on by
strengthening and making the existing rules more binding. Currently, there is
room for interpretation and enforcement is almost non-existent. Clarity and
simplicity of the rules, as well as compliance and enforcement mechanisms,
should be among the main guiding principles. These are the necessary
conditions for credibility of scal policies in the euro area.
Another direction is feasibility. There are many policy proposals on the table.
They range from fully edged scal union with substantial component of
federalism, to minor improvements to the current framework, to no changes
at all. Very often, suggestions that look economically attractive are not feasible
to implement in practice. For example, at the current juncture, a genuine scal
union with a common euro area budget and borrowing capacity is hardly
feasible owing to political and legal constraints. The idea of a euro area nance
ministry is also likely to be controversial in most member states.
Figure 3: Eectiveness and feasibility of alternative scal frameworks
MORE
EFFECTIVE
Genuine Fiscal Union
Euro area
finance ministry?
Current fiscal
framework
Enhanced current
framework
MORE FEASIBLE
LESS
EFFECTIVE
LESS FEASIBLE
However, better enforcement of our existing rules could also be achieved
by enhancing the current scal framework. Higher transparency, policy
credibility over the longer term and limited leeway for interpretation would
be the objectives of these potential changes.
Panel 3: Conducting monetary policy when scal space is limited
123
The experience of the last few years has shown that the current scal framework
has some limitations, especially when economies are hit by large negative
shocks. Thus, changes may be warranted. The content and details of these
changes may vary, but concrete policy proposals should be discussed with two
guiding principles in mind. These changes should (i) ensure credibility of the
scal framework, and (ii) be politically feasible.
Panellist 6: Lubomír Lízal
I would like to talk about the Czech experience with monetary policy when
scal space is limited. Briey, I would like to give you some avour of Livin’ on
the Edge, if I might go back to the musical analogy used by my predecessor.
28
Actually, the debate is not whether scal policy is the most ecient. That is
certain. The question always is whether there is space for scal policy that
can and should be used.
Figure 1: Five-year government bond yields of selected countries (% p.a.)
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Source: Bloomberg L.P., Thomson Datastream.
I would like to use Figure 1 to illustrate that, in general, any perception may
sometimes be completely wrong. In particular, at one extreme, perceptions of
no specic sovereign risk were widespread before 2008, when all countries in
Europe were more or less equal. After the crisis, you get complete divergence
of yields, which is just the other extreme of the same type of belief.
28 www.youtube.com/watch?v=7nqcL0mjMjw.
124 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
This graph illustrates two things I consider to be important. First, if you see
such a huge movement of the pendulum from one extreme to the other, you
might be worried about your own position, especially when you are not certain
whether the extremes were truly extreme.
The other thing is that, historically, all the small CEE countries are typically
viewed by analysts as being one big animal, not a group of small, sometimes
rather dierent species. The outside world does not distinguish the dierences.
This is quite a dangerous situation for these countries. Typically, you have a rst
movement that can be quite problematic, with huge overshooting, and after
that you probably see some correction. But the message is that the volatility
can be excessive with regard to individual fundamentals. Boris Vujčić has
shown that the Czech Republic had a public debt of somewhere around 40%
of GDP. From that you would conclude that the Czech Republic has quite
substantial space for scal expansion, fullling the SGP and all the criteria
that were there. That is a rational view. But, Czech scal policy was procyclical
before the crisis. Following the crisis and the related havoc on sovereign bond
markets, an anti-decit policy climate came into being. It was not easy to
be expansionary again, especially when the markets were on the verge of
punishing countries that had been having problems with scal decits. This
leads me to my second point.
One part of the problem we might have is the space that is truly available.
The second binding limit is the perceived space available. Given the discipline
of the markets that might be behind the curve or with a wrong swing of the
pendulum, the perceived scal space limits could be more detrimental than
the actual limits. You can see that although scal policy was expansionary
to some extent at the beginning, it was also procyclical with the real cyclical
position. So, monetary policy somehow had to react to that and provide the
needed additional stimulus. One thing I should mention regarding the local
situation is that Czech core ination had been negative for a long time, basically
since the start of the crisis (see adjusted ination in Figure 2). As the outside
environment was not that detrimental from the point of view of ination, the
central bank was able to cope with the situation using standard instruments.
But at the end of 2012, we got to the zero bound with our statutory rates. At
that time, the Czech National Bank switched to so-called technical zero, which
means that all deposit interest rates were set close to zero.
Panel 3: Conducting monetary policy when scal space is limited
125
Figure 2: Situation of the Czech economy in 2013
Core (adjusted) ination and prices of tradeables and non-tradeables (year-
on-year % change)
!"#
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%'() %'(* %'(+ %'$$ %'$& %'$) %'$* %'$+ %'%$ %'%& %'%)
,djusted inflation (except fuels)
?rices of tradables (except food and fuels)
?rices of non-tradables (except administered prices)
You can see the small blue dip at the end of the series of the non-tradable part
of ination in Figure 2. At that time, both elements of ination – domestic
and foreign – were on the verge of going into a deationary spiral. So the
question was what to do next. As an ination-targeter, you might have certain
well-justied exemptions as regards deviations from headline ination, but that
was not the case in 2013. At that time, central banks were facing limits on
standard monetary policy and had to use other instruments. We saw a lot of
forward guidance, but there were also other instruments on the table. Given
the specic situation of the Czech economy and the Czech nancial sector,
we had yet another problem (or maybe a blessing). We were in the opposite
situation to the majority of countries from a nancial stability point of view.
We are a net lender and the Czech nancial sector was, and still is, healthy and
ooded with liquidity. During the nancial crisis, the Czech Republic and its
public money did not have to save or help any bank operating in the country.
That actually means we were very close to what we might call a liquidity trap.
In that respect, you need to think about what a QE-type programme would be
doing. It would be putting further liquidity into a segment that does not need
126 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
it. In addition, all the excessive liquidity was parked at the central bank at that
time anyway. It was clear that providing liquidity would not bring about any
further monetary easing. The other thing I should mention is that, although
there was a debate about forward guidance, we were not sure it would provide
enough of a stimulus at that time. And last but not least, negative rates –
although they had been discussed, with the exception of the Danish central
bank, there were no cases of negative rates in 2013. But, most importantly, we
were afraid that the future might not be as bright as was perceived and that
another round of monetary easing would be needed. In that case, we would
face the same dilemma. Going slightly negative means you can go a bit further,
but if you need a substantial further loosening of monetary policy, you have
the same dilemma of choosing yet another instrument.
We opted for a foreign-exchange-type commitment. This is a modied
version of what you can nd in the papers by Lars Svensson, the former
deputy governor of the Swedish central bank, on escaping a liquidity trap.
We introduced some modications, but the economic principle was the same:
the central bank would announce a commitment to weaken the currency to a
level that is sustainable with respect to achieving the set ination target. From
that perspective, we believed that such a commitment – and I also refer to the
discussion in the rst panel yesterday – is a problem-solver in a situation where
other channels of monetary policy pass-through are not working that well.
To provide you with some avour of how it worked: it worked quite well on
the real economy but not on ination. In short, the situation of the Czech
economy in 2013 was characterised by extremely sluggish domestic demand.
The problems were of a domestic nature and did not relate to changes in
foreign demand. In this situation, we needed to loosen the monetary conditions,
and here the exchange rate commitment served us well. However, ination
remained quite low and was even lower than before. Figure 3 shows the
components of ination. The red bars are domestic pressures, and you can
see that after the commitment they turned from negative to positive. Headline
ination is being pushed down by oil and commodity prices, truly external
factors out of the control of the central bank.
Panel 3: Conducting monetary policy when scal space is limited
127
Figure 3: Contributions of the components of ination
Annual percentage changes; contributions in percentage points
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From this perspective, I would argue that the commitment has served us well,
although we have postponed the exit from the commitment several times due
to the fact that we have been in an era of low international commodity prices
and of disination from the euro area. Figure 4 summarises the real monetary
conditions, separating the eect of the interest rate from that of the exchange
rate. You can see that the central bank has always been on the loose side with
the interest rate, but with a oating exchange rate it is really the rate – see the
red bars below zero before the foreign exchange commitment – that has been
continuously tightening the monetary position.
128 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Figure 4: Czech monetary conditions
!"#$
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(%
)*"$ )*"+ )*"& )*", )*"' )*"- )*." )*.. )*.% )*.( )*.$ )*.+
)nterest rate component (right axis)
EZK/euro (left axis)
/DP decrease (right axis)
Dxchange rate component (right axis)
Lasic RMCI (right axis)2
Note: Positive values refer to easy monetary conditions and negative values to tight monetary
conditions.
Sources: Czech National Bank calculations.
When using the exchange rate, you always have to have a debate about beggar-
thy-neighbour policy. Any policy using the exchange rate, of course, is always
suspected of doing just that. Here, I have two simplied facts explaining why
our exchange rate commitment is not a beggar-thy-neighbour policy. If you
look at the eective exchange rate, you can see that the commitment set the rate
in real terms at more or less where it was before the crisis in 2007. Why? During
the crisis, the Czech currency witnessed quite a substantial appreciation, up to
10%. You can also see that other CEE peers – such as Hungary and Poland –
that had higher ination before the crisis had more standard space to loosen
their monetary policy, and thus also witnessed an accompanying decline in the
real exchange rate. For us, there was also a ripening of the sweet-gone-sour
fruits of low ination before the crisis. Since we were a low ination country
(close to Germany in terms of ination numbers), our standard monetary
space was also limited. And last but not least, as a paradox, one cannot use the
beggar-thy-neighbour label for the exchange rate policy in our case, because
after the commitment weakened the currency, we witnessed an increased rate
of imports. A completely counter-intuitive eect has been achieved. The reason
is that with the exchange rate commitment we have moved the real interest rate
Panel 3: Conducting monetary policy when scal space is limited
129
down, stimulating demand for investment – and the majority of the investment
is of an import nature. We saw an eect opposite to that which you would
normally see with a beggar-thy-neighbour policy.
General discussion
Dubravko Mihaljek: Are there any points that panellists would still like to
make, any emphasis that they would like to add, any reactions to what others
have said? We have, broadly speaking, moved from considering room for
monetary policy in a situation where countries do not have their own monetary
policy and scal policy is constrained by rules to situations where countries
have quite a bit of space both because scal policy is relatively disciplined and
other instruments have been used, like foreign exchange rate like the case of
the Czech Republic and counter-cyclical macroprudential tools in Croatia. A
recurrent theme of these presentations is that with ongoing scal consolidation,
it helps a lot when there are some structural reforms. One particular form
of structural reform that would be desirable in this circumstance, and was
mentioned by Boris Vujčić, is corporate-sector restructuring; in particular,
equity injections in the corporate sector so as to boost the collateral base that
could then help restart the transmission mechanism through the banking sector.
Bojan Ivanc (Chamber of Commerce of Slovenia): A comment on your
view on sustainable future GDP growth of the euro area. Potential growth
is based on productivity, on working age and how long we spend working, as
well as on the ratio of working age population to the total population. The
demographics are pretty negative for EU monetary union. Also, if we examine
productivity in the past and then try to project it forward, we have to admit
that the job market currently is dierent from what it was years before. More
jobs are in the service sector, where productivity cannot increase as fast as in
the manufacturing sector. In terms of productivity, this is bad news for future
GDP growth. My point is that if you see lower GDP growth going forward,
that would mean that the scal space is limited already and that the country
should tighten scal policy. Otherwise, in times of a new crisis there would
be no space left.
Suzanne Bishopric (Global Sovereign Advisors): My question is about
creating more scal space through cleaning out the closet eectively. Boris
Vujčić talked about low asset valuations impeding the borrowing capabilities
of companies. What other techniques are there to free up that capacity?
Policies such as assets sales, bankruptcy improvements to make the process
more streamlined and write-os might free up the liquidity.
130 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Mojmir Mrak (Faculty of Economics and Center of Excellence in
Finance, Ljubljana): I have one question for the panel. We are talking about
limited scal space and we always somehow come to the issue of a very high
level of public debt. What are the views of the panellists regarding the ways
to bring down debt to a sustainable level? Because the 60% debt-to-GDP ratio
has proved not to be a sustainable level for some countries. I remember that
Slovenia had a problem getting access at a debt level of 45% of GDP. What
are the alternative ways of bringing down the debt ratio? Primary surplus?
It takes very long. Privatisation? Yes, but it also has limited success. We are
basically talking about a process of 10–15 years. What about ination? Maybe
these are questions for the people from governments, but it would be useful to
have the views of central bankers.
Erik Jones (Johns Hopkins University): Three quick questions. First,
reecting on this panel and the second panel that we had yesterday afternoon,
can we identify the scal space before the factors, or is it something we only
recognise after it has passed? It seems there is a signicant measurement
problem. Second, can we mark a clear boundary between monetary policy and
scal policy, particularly when monetary authorities are engaging in seemingly
unending large-scale asset purchases? I am just curious. Third, I was very
struck by Vitas Vasiliauskas’ presentation on the failure of reform. How do
we explain that every single country is failing to engage in reform? Because
political will ceases to be a minimum category when nobody has it. Is there
something about the political reform process that needs to be revisited?
Mejra Festić (Bank of Slovenia): Related to the protracted period of
economic recovery and all the pressures faced by the banking sector – on
account of low or negative interest rates, income risk, low interest margins,
unstable structure of liabilities, deposit outows and other associated risks – for
how long are these pressures sustainable for the banks from the point of view
of banking sector consolidation and scal consolidation?
Lucio Pench (European Commission): I would like to go back to a point
that was made in the introductory remarks. In the rst phase of the crisis,
we had an unprecedented increase in public debt – reecting expansionary
scal policy worldwide – associated with large revenue losses and unchanged
expenditure trends. Against this background of very high public debt, not only
has a rise in ination not materialised, but we nd ourselves in the opposite
situation. In this context, let me draw attention to the fact, highlighted by my
esteemed friend Francesco Papadia,
29
that nominal interest rates are probably
at their lowest level ever. I do agree with the point made by Ardo Hansson
29 Chair of the Selection Panel of the Hellenic Financial Stability Fund.
Panel 3: Conducting monetary policy when scal space is limited
131
that we should be realistic about growth prospects; namely, the pre-crisis trend
may not resume. Still, when we think about the dierence between the interest
rate and growth rate, which is what matters for public debt sustainability,
we should acknowledge that something unusual is happening. Contrary to
common assumptions, as reected in the intervention by Boris Vujčič, the
interest rate‒growth rate dierential is not feeding the “snowball eect”, but is
working the other way around. Current data and the forecasts for the next few
years suggest that more and more countries will benet from a snowball eect
in reverse. In turn, this suggests the existence of a situation of excess saving
or excess demand for safe assets. I believe that in our reection on the role of
scal policy, we should factor in this peculiar situation and the concomitant
need for deleveraging, which was highlighted in several presentations.
Steve Phillips (IMF): I have two questions related to the Czech Republic’s
use of the exchange rate to achieve monetary policy objectives. The rst
question is whether this technique is generalisable to other economies. Is there
something special about the Czech Republic that made the technique more
likely to succeed and less likely to run into problems, compared with other
economies that are larger or less open to trade? The second question picks up
on the suggestion that this was a beggar-thy-neighbour policy. A beggar-thy-
neighbour policy would seek to divert demand by weakening the real exchange
rate. But I understand that was not the intention. The Czech authorities were
not trying to change the real exchange rate but rather to stimulate ination,
hoping that wages and prices would respond to the weaker nominal exchange
rate, so that the initial competitive advantage would be eroded. I wonder to
what extent that has happened.
Nikolay Gueorguiev (IMF): I have one question and one comment. The
question is about the ECB and ination. Not all ination is the same – there
is demand-driven ination and cost-push ination. This may become very
relevant a few months from now when the eect of energy prices on ination
may suddenly become positive as the base eect gets out of the picture, or
if energy prices continue to go up as they have in the past few weeks. I am
curious about what the panellists think is the right policy response in the euro
area if headline ination goes to, say, 2.5% but core ination remains at 1%,
real wages do not particularly respond and demand continues to be depressed.
The comment is on the scal dividend of QE. Let me use the occasion to
advertise work we did in the context of the 2015 Article IV Consultation
discussions on Slovenia. We tried to estimate what is the benet to the public
in terms of interest savings for all euro area countries from QE relative to the
(admittedly hard to estimate) counterfactual without QE. We found that it
132 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
is not negligible – in the neighbourhood of 0.25 to 0.75 percentage points a
year, depending on the country’s level of debt and how expensive it has been.
Now the interesting question is what to do with this dividend, which most
likely cannot go on forever. So, it is natural to say let us save it in full. There
is a good argument that in an environment of decient demand as well as
decient supply of infrastructure, some would be spent on infrastructure in
the countries that need such investment most badly.
Matija Lozej (Central Bank of Ireland): Since Ireland was mentioned several
times, let me comment on that. The reason why scal space has disappeared
in Ireland is because this was all done before the “whatever it takes” statement
by Mario Draghi; so bond spreads went up. If this had been done afterwards,
it might be that things would work dierently and the sovereign could go
through by itself. My question is whether you think that such a statement, that
brings the spread together or keeps them within a range, would be a sensible
policy when, for instance, ination is very low, and whether this should be
institutionalised.
Ardo Hansson: With regard to the issue that scal space is limited and that it
might take another 10 or 15 years. During the second session yesterday, Lars
Rohde presented data that showed that public debt relative to GDP in Denmark
is gradually coming down. If you look at Sweden and Canada and some other
historical periods, you could nd cases where the situation looked desperate but
owing to various factors – good scal policy, good structural policy and some
good luck – the debt-to-GDP ratio crept down a few percentage points per
year. I do not know of any country that has done anything terribly dramatic
overnight and suddenly cut a lot of debt or suddenly implemented one reform
that kicked o great growth. I think it is a little bit of all the dierent elements
of the debt accumulation equation.
Second, identifying scal space in real time is a real challenge, and some of the
presentations this morning tried to make that point. In our case (Estonia), the
apparent output gap was not that large in the middle of the boom. However,
now in retrospect, the European Commission says it was +10 or +12% of GDP.
Had we known that at that time, there would be a dierent policy response.
In real time, there is a bias towards thinking you are pretty close to potential
output and afterwards you learn that there was this cyclical component you
did not even really think you had. It is probably necessary to look at a range of
indicators and synthesise them. I made a similar point about looking at labour
market indicators. We had a discussion with the IMF about Estonia’s level of
scal space. Anybody can combine these dierent indicators in dierent ways.
One says you are above capacity, the other says you are below, and in the end
Panel 3: Conducting monetary policy when scal space is limited
133
the government has to make an informed judgement. In our case, when I see
labour costs or wages growing at above 6.5% a year, to me that is a red ag
that says you are probably going too far and that you do not have enough
room to expand, regardless of what others say. If you conduct the thought
experiment and ask if I want to further stimulate the economy and get wages
growing at 8% a year, probably not.
Vitas Vasiliausaks: I would like to touch upon a few aspects of the various
questions from the audience related to my presentation, namely, the negative
factors that can inuence sustainable GDP growth and how we can explain the
lack of fullment of country-specic recommendations (CSR). Every year, our
country gets a lot of recommendations from various institutions, starting with
the European Commission, the IMF during its Article IV missions, as well as
others. We receive a lot of valuable advice from them. Of course, there is no
common recipe for all countries, and we have to talk about country-by-country
specics and individual solutions. If we are talking about the magical word or
term “structural reforms”, we should keep in mind that their content depends
on various individual cases. For example, in my country (Lithuania), for the
last three years we got essentially the same recommendations in relation to
reform of the labour market, pensions and the tax system. I think it is more
or less the same situation in the other countries relating to the more than 100
unfullled or not fully implemented CSRs. I have a very simple view of why
this is the case. First, there is no political will to implement reforms. Second,
we have a very short political cycle and politicians quite often are short-term
oriented. Third, we still need to implement those corrective and compliance-
enhancing functions that have been agreed upon at the European level. When
it comes to deciding on the appropriate action in the case of non-fullment,
colleagues at various councils think: “Maybe I will be next? Perhaps I should
then be more exible today?” I think these three things must be improved and
then we can talk about a better situation in the future.
Jozef Makúch: I have two points. First, monetary policy cannot be a substitute
for scal policy. This is not only because of our mandate; the problem is
broader than that. Second, monetary policy faces the heterogeneity of scal
policies across the euro area. Yesterday’s presentations were excellent, including
the one by Agnès Bénassy Quéré. Among the questions for policymakers may
be how to extend integration in scal institutions and how to make scal policy
and monetary policy more consistent and coordinated at the euro area level.
Boris Vujčić: The way to address structural issues in the corporate sector is
not only by providing more equity but also by cleaning up balance sheets. This
is going on throughout Europe, including in my country (Croatia). There have
134 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
been assets sales in countries that have had the biggest problems, like Ireland
and Spain. But those who bought these non-performing assets went elsewhere
when the liquidity dried up and as the provisioning increased throughout
the crisis. There were also more incentives for the banks to sell, plus you
had changes in management in most of the banks. New management in
commercial banks are more willing to sell the old people’s babies, but they
do not want to sell their own at 15 cents to the euro. This is the price. Then
you have a problem: well capitalised banks can do it, poorly capitalised banks
have a great problem admitting what shape they are in. If you look around
Europe, poorly capitalised banks are still holding on to extending, pretending
and trying to shue through. This is the problem. Unlike the United States,
we have not xed the banking problem in Europe yet. Of course, there is a
huge dierence in the bankruptcy procedures compared to those in the United
States. In Europe, they are much less ecient than in the United States. This
matter should be xed through structural reforms, for which there is not that
much political will.
As for the sustainable level of public debt, I do not know what it is.
I agree with Ardo Hansson that scal space is more an art than a science. You
have to look at everything, including whether I have space to manoeuvre in the
short run which will basically enable a medium- to long-run debt sustainability
goal. This kind of thing changes over time from year to year, and it is very
dicult to estimate what the potential rate of growth of output is and what are
the implicit scal liabilities. The problem in Ireland was mentioned: Ireland
had a huge implicit scal liability. It is very dicult to be honest ex ante about
how things are and even to see through them. Sometimes people see and do
not want to admit, sometimes they do not see. It is always the combination
of the two things. For example, the right way to examine the scal position
is to look at the net scal position in terms of the explicit and implicit scal
liabilities. The European Commission accounts for the implicit scal liabilities,
but the private market looks only at the headline public debt. For example, if
you have a country which nationalised its private pension system and reduced
the public debt, and Moody’s and Standard & Poor’s upgraded their ratings
on this basis, it gives a completely wrong incentive to the policymakers to do
exactly the wrong thing. We have a lot of problems in the way that we look at
the public accounts. At the moment, we have something that is not conducive
to good scal policymaking and is providing the wrong incentives.
I will skip the question on the dierence between monetary policy and scal
policy when central banks embark on large-scale asset purchases.
Panel 3: Conducting monetary policy when scal space is limited
135
There was a question on the banking sector. I see a lot of problems for the
banking sector in Europe to reinvent their business model in the medium
to long run. People from the banking sector can say more about that. The
business model in CEEs is to get money cheap in the home market and lend
expensively in the CEEs. This is a very simple model that worked ne for some
time. However, what you see now is that the whole CEE region is becoming
like the Czech Republic, where the loan-to-deposit ratios are going the other
way around. Soon you have more deposits than loans, and the banking model
does not work that much any longer. Regulatory costs have gone up, fees are
dicult to increase at the moment and, with no interest margins, you cannot
expect banks to charge signicant negative interest rates to the retail sector.
Interest rates go to zero and stay there. Maybe for corporate large holders of
deposits you can, but for the rest it is very dicult. I am not giving investment
advice, but for the banking sector is very dicult to see the business model in
the medium term.
On the snowball eect, I did not say that low interest rates do not help reduce
the snowball eect. Of course they do, by denition. I said that most increases
in the public debt happened not because of the primary balances but because
of the snowball eect. Of course, it was the interest rate. This is probably the
most that it does because it does not have much impact on the real economy,
but it is reducing the snowball eect for the government. That cannot last
forever. You cannot rely on extremely low interest rates forever to do the trick
with the scal position. That is why we need structural reform.
Hans-Helmut Kotz: The point that Erik Jones stressed – the dierence
between ex post reasoning and ex ante analysis – is of the essence. Let me
illustrate. Just try to recall why virtually all of us had such condence in
economic perspectives in early 2007. Against this background, it is enlightening
as well as somewhat amusing to listen to all those who, with precious ex post
or hindsight knowledge, now tell us why all was awed at that time. To be
honest, critical voices were in a tiny minority at the time, and were treated as
grumbling dissenters from benign conventional views. I recall when a good
friend of mine, Thomas Mayer, was derided as a doomsayer when he was
expressing concerns about Spain, noting that one third of European growth
came from there, mainly out of construction which had a share of about
14% of GDP. Another instance is, of course, Raghu Rajan’s speech given in
2005 at the Jackson Hole conference. Rajan, then the IMF’s chief economist,
made the case that trouble might arise from the unchartered interactions of
micro-hedging instruments (such as credit default swaps and collateralised debt
obligations); they might add up to macro trouble. In the ensuing discussion,
136 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Rajan was literally treated as a sort of a backward-minded nance Luddite.
I also recall the reaction to the publication of a not-very-positive article on
credit default swaps in the Bundesbank’s Monthly Report of December 2004.
To be brief, group thinking abounds in technocratic policymaking circles.
To counter this prevailing fact and to enrich our decision basis, there is a
need for critical thinking. Let me highlight two points from our discussion
which I nd remarkable. The Croatian Governor, Boris Vujčić, told us that
he conducted monetary policy by using macroprudential instruments. Of
course, long ago this would have been deemed as unconventional, that is,
unacceptable. When the Bank of Spain, building on empirical evidence, started
using statistical provisioning – what is now called “dynamic provisioning” –
to quasi-automatically slow down credit growth, it was assessed as not being
in line with international accounting standards. Nobody even wanted to
discuss it in 2004, 2005, and so on. Dampening credit growth was judged
as pretence of knowledge: how can you know that private credit is not in
line with fundamentals? What can justify public intervention? This amounts
to falling back on old-fashioned capital controls. Meanwhile, of course, the
general sentiment has changed very fundamentally indeed. There are good
reasons for a reassessment of those instruments. In Germany, for example,
house prices in a few regions are rising at a clip which leaves room for doubt.
The ECB’s monetary policy, conducted with an eye on the euro area average,
obviously cannot address this.
The second issue I would like to discuss has to do with the coordination of
macro policy tools. Incomes policy, be it implicit or explicit, used to be part
of the macroeconomic toolbox in some Northern European economies. Take
again Germany, where wages evolve more or less in line with productivity,
and labour unions feel a responsibility for their rms. This impacts the real
exchange rate, which of course still exists in the monetary union. Coordinated
wage settlement institutions thus provide macro stabilisation. To understand
what is happening in the euro area, it is crucial to think about the interactions
of the variety of industrial relations that we have. This is not important for the
United States incidentally. The United States has not fared that outstandingly
well after the global nancial crisis. The ratio of gross debt to GDP went up
from about 60% to 107%. A number of states actually took a larger hit in
terms of GDP per capita than Greece. Real median household income is
somewhere close to that in the late 1980s, not to speak of the lower income
deciles, which are around what prevailed in the 1960s. The United States is
challenged by quite similar issues of productivity, potential growth and so on.
Panel 3: Conducting monetary policy when scal space is limited
137
In short, we have to seriously think about the coordination of scal policy and
monetary policy in order to achieve macro stabilisation in a scally constrained
environment. Both work through the same funnel, to quote James Tobin.
The global nancial crisis ushered in very high levels of debt. They force us
to reconsider how our economies work and adapt to that. Governor Boris
Vujčić is right. Historically, according to Rogo and Reinhart, 70% of debt
deleveraging came from ination and not from growth.
Boris Vujčić: There is a question that we have not answered: why we cannot
produce ination now to help debt leverage.
Hans Helmut Kotz: Two points. First, only unexpected ination would
ultimately help, if I may say so. Otherwise, both parties to the debt contract
would account for it. Second, our lacklustre nominal (and real) growth of
output has to do with both demand and supply. To quote Paul Samuelson, the
Lord gave us two eyes to watch both. It is a general equilibrium question. If you
just look at the supply side, if you just care about structural issues, you will end
up where we are in Europe. Brad De Long, Larry Summers, Paul Krugman
and others have launched an important debate in the United States. They insist
that, given the environment we are in, we should invest more in infrastructure,
broadly understood. What I see in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where I live
about ve months a year, is that public sector infrastructure evidently has quite
some room for improvement. Unfortunately, though not to the same degree,
similar issues exist in Germany. We have had to shut down bridges that have
not been appropriately maintained. This has been called “saving”. Actually,
it is undermining Germany’s future capacity to produce. There are other
options. It is not only the supply side.
Gent Sejko: There are many issues. Regarding growth, from the view point
of a transition country like Albania, which has still to complete the transition
process, we have faced the same phenomenon as the other countries in the
region and even wider in the euro area. We had a drop in economic growth,
and now our challenge is how to achieve sustainable growth and go back to
the levels we had before 2008. This requires revising the economic model
and undertaking certain structural reforms, some of which are ongoing. But,
these reforms have to be carefully considered and smartly undertaken by
the government and all the actors. This is not possible with monetary policy
alone. The central bank has to play its role, but without a clear strategy and
good structural reforms undertaken by the government, we cannot achieve
the desirable growth.
138 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
With regard to the questions on banking sector deleveraging and the risk
premium, we cannot support growth without good support from lending. We
look for foreign direct investment, but at this point nancial support is also
very crucial. After 2008, banks faced diculties in countries like ours. Most
of them have their headquarters in EU countries so they are under the ECB’s
regulatory framework, and most of them are deleveraging. These policies are
reected in a less aggressive lending policy, at least less so than before. As the
central bank, we are very carefully watching the equilibrium between monetary
policy and nancial stability. On one side, we apply certain models to achieve
our price stability, which is our main focus; but on the other side, this is achieved
only in a good economic climate, which has to be signicantly impacted by
lending as well. However, we cannot push banks too much because there is a
high NPL portfolio. So we need to care about the balance between nancial
stability and monetary policy. There is only one way, in terms of nancial
stability and in terms of banking. If banks do not have a good performance
in lending, they have to be more prudent. However, there is potential. The
story links economic growth and the nancial stability role, but also the need
to identify where the best potential of the country is. Once it was construction
and that still could remain, but there are also some other industries which
have advantages and can be attractive, like tourism, agriculture or, in some
countries, mining. These are all linked together.
Lubomír Lízal: A lot has been said about the questions, and I will be more
provocative. I would say that there is no scal space. And we know it ex ante.
The idea of looking just at government debt is ne in the short term, but in
the long term – looking at the prospects, the implicit debts, accounting for an
ageing population, for the fact that you have promises for the pension system,
for health care getting more expensive as longevity constantly increases – it is
giving you the same answer I gave you, namely, there is no space on the scal
side. It is really very dicult to admit that. From the long-term perspective, it
goes beyond any political cycle. In this regard, I am quite sceptical. I think what
we are going to see is just some sort of muddling through. Whenever there is
a problem, we fail to get to the heart of it. This is what has been mentioned
regarding infrastructure investment. Over past decades, governments have
been inclined to cut investment rather than current expenditure. There has
even been an incentive to increase the implicit burden. If there is a problem
with unemployment, what are we going to do? We will give an incentive to
retire early. But this is just another form of borrowing from the future. The
root of the problem is that at the beginning of the past century, we invented
how to borrow from the future, and we are now using it all the time. So, this
is probably putting a limit on future development in the general sense.
Panel 3: Conducting monetary policy when scal space is limited
139
One more point related to debt. Of course, when governments were facing
the nancial crisis, it was easy to say “no more taxpayers’ money”. It is really
popular to say that, but it is also to some extent limiting our ability to invest,
in the sense that the state – as the major investor in infrastructure and other
parts of the economy – is cutting investment expenditure because there are
other pressures, especially as regards fullling expenditures that have a short-
term horizon with respect to the political cycle. The only remaining party that
can pick up the investment nancing needs is private investors in the nancial
sector. However, at the same time we are giving them the wrong incentives,
saying that you need more capital deleverage and that you should match the
maturities of your liabilities and assets. This is destroying the last tool that
was there for investing in long-term growth and long-term prospects. Given
all that, I would be a little bit sceptical.
I agree with the point on the Czech Republic’s use of exchange rate policy.
What lay behind it was a need to change expectations – to move ination
expectations and, hence, real interest rates. But that is always dicult to
explain to the general public. I even had diculty explaining it to economists.
I am rather sceptical about the usefulness of generalising the model to other
countries. The situation was specic. It was a self-inicted contraction of the
Czech economy, and we had excess liquidity. I would agree that this requires
specic conditions.
Dubravko Mihaljek: Would anyone like to address the question on good
and bad ination?
Ardo Hansson: It is a good point, but one does not approach this
mechanistically. We have a very detailed model, a multi-year model where
we synthesise all the monetary and the real eects and look at the medium
term. The deationary eect of falling commodity prices is weakened at some
point in time as the base eect is eliminated. Much of that is already built
into the model. We look through these short-term uctuations. One does not
attach a lot of importance as long as we see that the medium-term anchor and
our measure of inationary expectations are all right. Patience works in both
directions: when we see there is a period which was hit by negative shocks,
we lter some of them out. But, now we have seen oil prices go up a lot and
we do not quickly react in the other direction. It requires looking at the future
horizon through these models and evaluating them.
Dubravko Mihaljek: Mr. Kotz, a last word on the Irish experience.
Hans-Helmut Kotz: That is a very important question. Why? Monetary policy
has been supra-nationalised in the ECB. This is tantamount to having a stateless
money. From this perspective, EMU member states are sub-sovereigns. They
140 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
cannot rely on their central bank providing liquidity when in trouble. EMU’s
institutions were conceived without anything like a backstop facility. Crises on
the scale we experienced were not foreseen. Therefore, a backstop facility was
not a part of the plan. It was also rejected since such an insurance mechanism
might create the wrong incentives. Therefore, the European Stability Facility
was only introduced against strong resistance in 2010, as were the permanent
European Stability Mechanism and President Draghi’s “whatever it takes”
policy. There is a good case to be made that those contingent liabilities which
ew in the face of the Irish might have been dealt with in a signicantly
less costly way, as the question asked by Matija Lozej surmised, had such a
backstop facility been around as well as ways of restructuring and unwinding
banks. A monetary union without a facility addressing the roll-over risk for
liquidity (not solvency) issues of member states is one which is very vulnerable.
Maybe, Mr. Chairman, you are on the right way – letting me end with this
more positive note.
Dubravko Mihaljek: After 2½ hours, it is hard to summarise in one
sentence. One of the messages of this panel is that we need to look out of the
conventional toolbox. Several ideas were mentioned: macroprudential tools,
wage policy and the coordination of scal policy and monetary policy, the
overall umbrella topic of this conference. The idea that there may have been
too much emphasis on trying to look for policies that boost supply is ne, but
it is more long term. We also need to look at demand management ideas.
Closing remarks
Fabrizio Coricelli, Paris School of Economics and CEPR
Coordination between monetary and scal policy is at the heart of the current
debate in Europe. As evidenced in several presentations at this seminar, the
issue involves not only problems of macroeconomic management, but also
deeper problems of the process of integration in the European Union. Indeed,
while at least in the euro area, monetary policy has been transferred to a
common institution – namely, the ECB – scal policy remains in the hands of
individual countries and, more importantly, the common rules are increasingly
seen as an obstacle to needed policies to stimulate the timid recovery of output
and employment in the EU. The problem is that, dierently from monetary
policy, a sizable scal stimulus requires public expenditure that has to be
nanced by those countries that have government resources, either through
taxation or through their commitment to service the debt generated to nance
public expenditure. A large scal stimulus at the EU level would necessarily
involve a redistribution of resources and/or a redistribution of liabilities on
debt issued to nance the stimulus. For this reason, the issue of coordination
between scal and monetary policy is deeply rooted in the broader issue of
further integration in the EU.
There was broad consensus in the seminar on the need for a more eective
countercyclical scal policy in the EU and on the need for “positive” measures
such as EU-wide public investment projects or common social expenditure
in the form of, for instance, common unemployment benets. Policies based
simply on constraints coming from common rules risk further reducing support
for the EU project.
Returning to the main theme of the seminar, the key question addressed was
what roles scal and monetary policy can play in getting the economies of the
EU and the euro area out of a “stagnation trap”. In this regard, views were
divided. Some believed that the problem of anaemic growth in Europe was
due to structural issues that cannot be tackled by monetary/scal policies.
Others emphasised the fact that monetary policy had practically exhausted
its tools to stimulate the economy, and thus scal policy should take the lead.
The heterogeneity between scal positions, especially debt-to-GDP ratios,
of the “periphery” and the “core” of the euro area is a major obstacle to an
eective common scal policy. Nevertheless, one manifestation of the problems
associated with the lack of coordination between monetary and scal policy in
142 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
the euro area has been the fact that ECB policy has been driven by the objective
of avoiding a debt crisis through policies that ended up with commercial banks
purchasing government debt with funds injected by the ECB.
Beyond the contrast between lack of demand and supply bottlenecks:
Financial crisis
The continuing debate on whether growth is blocked by lack of demand or by
supply-side bottlenecks neglects the fact that the Great Recession was mainly
driven by a nancial crisis. Financial crises involve both supply-side channels
and demand-side channels. To draw a “mechanical” analogy, a nancial crisis
can be represented as a car engine breaking down. Thinking about pure
demand as the fuel needed for a car to run, it is clear that without repairing the
engine, the car cannot run. This does not mean that the fuel is not needed for
the car to run. Repairing the engine in the current context of Europe means
xing the nancial sector, which in many countries is still in a weak condition
eight years since the start of the crisis. Especially in the periphery of the
euro area, the nancial sector is still dysfunctional, with credit allocation very
inecient. As a result, the real economy suers from lack of credit. There is
ample evidence that banks purchase government bonds rather than lending,
and that the lending that is carried out seems to be still directed to nancing
inecient rms in order for them to repay the old debt with the banks (“zombie
lending”). In summary, the recovery in several EU countries is undermined
by the dysfunctional role of the nancial sector.
At the time of the creation of the euro, one major criticism, especially from
the United States, of the construction of the European Monetary Union was
the lack of scal backing to the newly created ECB. In the current debate, one
the main drawbacks of the euro has been identied as the lack of “monetary”
backing for scal policy. In other words, countries in the euro area face a
problem in their sovereign debt because of the absence of a national central
bank that could eventually monetise such debt.
Fiscal backing of ECB policy and monetary backing of scal policies
These positions seem not well founded and in some ways rather dangerous.
Indeed, they downplay the role of the euro as an asset for countries otherwise
subject to serious risks of runs on their currencies. If Italy, Portugal or Greece
were to abandon the euro in favour of reintroducing their national currency,
they would hardly benet from the possibility of printing money to “monetise”
their debt. In the context of open economies and free mobility of capital, the
result would be a ight out of their national currencies with consequent deep
crises, rather than a reduction of the burden of government debt.
Closing remarks
143
In summary, despite clear diculties, a more ecient coordination between
monetary and scal policies in the euro area and in the EU calls for deeper
integration in Europe. Such a road does not appear popular these days.
However, a “closer EU” is not a romantic and unrealistic dream, but perhaps
the only way to ensure against disintegration of Europe.
About the speakers
Dimitar Bogov is Governor of the National Bank of the Republic of
Macedonia. He has 21 years of work experience, including nine years in
management positions in the government sector, one year in business
consultancy and four years in a senior position in the largest Macedonian
bank. From February 2007 to May 2011, Mr. Bogov was Vice Governor of the
National Bank of Republic of Macedonia responsible for nancial markets,
foreign exchange reserves management and payment systems. He holds an
MBA from Sheeld University.
Cláudia Rodriguez Braz is Head of the Public Finance Unit in the Public
Finance and Structural Studies Division at the Banco de Portugal. She is also
Chairperson of the Working Group on Public Finance at the European System
of Central Banks (ESCB). Ms. Rodriguez Braz graduated in 1996 from the
Nova University of Lisbon and continued her studies at the same university,
attending the master’s and PhD programmes. Alongside, she taught several
courses from 1996 to 2007. Ms. Rodriguez Braz contributes extensively to
regular publications of the Banco de Portugal and has a frequent advisory role
to the Board of Banco de Portugal regarding public nance issues.
Agnès Bénassy-Quéré is a Professor at Paris School of Economics, University
of Paris 1 Panthéon Sorbonne, and Chairperson of the French Council of
Economic Analysis. She is also a member of the Commission Economique
de la Nation (an advisory body to the nance minister), the French macro-
prudential authority, the Cercle des Economistes, and is aliated with CESIfo.
After obtaining her PhD in Economics from University Paris-Dauphine,
Professor Bénassy-Quéré worked for the French Ministry of Economy and
Finance and then moved to successive academic positions at Universities of
Cergy-Pontoise, Lille 2, Paris-Ouest and Ecole Polytechnique. She also has
served as Deputy Director and Director of CEPII, as a columnist at France
Culture and as a member of the Shadow ECB Council.
Fabrizio Coricelli is Professor of Economics at Paris School of Economics,
Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne and a Research Fellow of the Centre
for Economic Policy Research (CEPR). He is also CEPR-Director of the
European Central Banking Network. He has served as Director of Research at
the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (2007-08), Economic
Adviser at the European Commission (2001-2002), Senior Economist at the
World Bank (1989-1993) and Economist at the International Monetary Fund
145About the speakers
(1987-1989). His research and professional activity has concentrated on the
economics of emerging markets, with a special focus on transition countries.
He holds a PhD in Economics from the University of Pennsylvania.
Giovanni Dell’Ariccia is Deputy Director of the Research Department
at the International Monetary Fund, where he supervises the activities of
the Macro-Financial Division. Previously he worked in the Asia and Pacic
Department. Mr Dell’Ariccia holds a PhD from MIT and a bachelor’s degree
from the University of Rome. He is a CEPR Research Fellow. His has published
numerous papers in major economics and nance journals.
Nikolay Gueorguiev is Unit Chief in the European Department at the
International Monetary Fund. He has been the IMF Mission Chief for Slovenia
and Austria since October 2015. Previously, he served as the Mission Chief
for Ukraine, Croatia, and Moldova. Prior to joining the IMF, he was a Deputy
Minister of Finance in Bulgaria. Mr Gueorguiev holds a PhD in Economics
from the University of Maryland at College Park, where he specialised in
open economy macroeconomics, international nance, and economics of the
transition to a market economy.
Ardo Hansson is the Governor of Eesti Pank and a member of the Governing
Council of the European Central Bank since June 2012. Dr. Hansson worked
for the World Bank from 1998 to 2012, where he worked on several countries
in Eastern Europe and the Western Balkans and and also served as Lead
Economist of the World Bank’s Economics Unit in China. During 1991‒1997,
he held several senior positions in the Republic of Estonia, including Economic
Adviser to the Estonian prime minister and adviser to the minister of foreign
aairs. Dr. Hansson was also a member of the Monetary Reform Committee
and a member of the Supervisory Board of the Bank of Estonia during
1993‒1998. During the 1990s, he also was engaged in short-term consulting
assignments for the governments of Mongolia, Poland, Slovenia and Ukraine.
He graduated from the University of British Columbia in 1980 and earned a
PhD in Economics from Harvard University in 1987. Following the completion
of his studies, Dr. Hansson held faculty and research positions at several
well-known universities in Canada, Finland and Sweden. He has published
numerous articles on economic policy.
Boštjan Jazbec is Governor of the Bank of Slovenia since July 2013. He is
also a member of the Governing Council of the European Central Bank. Dr.
Jazbec has previously worked as a short-term consultant for the European
Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) and the World Bank in
Washington, DC. In July 2003, he was appointed to the Board of the Bank of
Slovenia and held this post until 2008. Thereafter, until June 2013, he worked
146 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
as a consultant to the International Monetary Fund at the central banks of
Kosovo and Suriname. He graduated from the University of Ljubljana and
continued his studies at the Central European University in Budapest and
Prague. After completing his PhD studies in Economics at the Institute for
Advanced Studies in Vienna, Dr. Jazbec defended his doctoral thesis on real
exchange rate determination in transition economies at the University of
Ljubljana.
Erik Jones is Professor of European Studies and International Political
Economy and Director of European and Eurasian Studies at the Paul H. Nitze
School of Advanced International Studies of the Johns Hopkins University.
He is also a Senior Research Fellow at Nueld College, University of Oxford.
Professor Jones is the author of several books and editor or co-editor of more
than 20 books or special issues of journals on topics related to European politics
and political economy, including the reference works The Oxford Handbook
of the European Union (2012) and The Oxford Handbook of Italian Politics
(2015), and the teaching works Developments in European Politics 2 (2011)
and Europe Today, Fifth Edition (2014). Professor Jones is a contributing editor
of Survival and co-editor of Government and Opposition. His commentary
has appeared in numerous outlets including the Financial Times, New York Times,
USA Today, and other major newspapers across Europe and North America.
Hans-Helmut Kotz is Program Director of the SAFE Policy Center, Goethe
University, Frankfurt. He also is a Resident Fellow at Harvard’s Center for
European Studies, directing its European Economic Policy Program as well
as teaching in Harvard’s Economics Department. In addition, Professor.
Kotz is on Freiburg University’s Economics faculty, where he received the
University Teaching Award. From 2002 to April 2010, he was a member of
the Executive Board of Deutsche Bundesbank, in charge of nancial stability,
markets, statistics and IT, and a member of committees of the ECB, the BIS,
the FSB as well as the OECD, where he was chair of the Financial Markets
Committee. He was also the Deutsche Bundesbank Deputy for the G7/G8
and the G20 process. Proferssor Kotz has published widely and is involved in
a number of academic institutions.
Lubomír Lízal is a member of the Bank Board of the Czech National
Bank since February 2011. He is currently also a member of the Executive
and Supervisory Committee of CERGE-EI and of the Governing Board of
the Dynamics of Institutions and Markets in Europe research network. He
was Deputy Director for Science in 2002, and Director of the Economics
Institute of the Czech Academy of Sciences and CERGE during from 2003
to 2008. In 2006, he qualied as an Associate Professor in Economics at
147About the speakers
Charles University. Mr Lízal graduated in Systems Programming from the
Czech Technical University and holds a PhD in Economics from CERGE,
Charles University.
Jozef Makúch is Governor of the National Bank of Slovakia (NBS) and a
member of the ECB’s Governing Council since 2010. As Governor of the NBS,
he is also a Governor of the International Monetary Fund and an Alternate
Governor of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development.
Previously, he served as a member of the NBS Bank Board and Executive
Director (1993‒1996 and 2006‒2010). He was appointed Chairman of the
Slovak Financial Market Authority in 2000, and served as Chairman of the
ÚFT Board of Directors from 2002 to 2005. Mr. Makúch graduated from
the University of Economics in Bratislava in 1976 and was a faculty member
there from 1978 to 1994. He is currently a member of the academic councils
of the University of Economics in Bratislava, of the Economics faculties of
the University of Economics in Prague and Matej Bel University in Banská
Bystrica (Slovakia), and of the Administrative Council of Comenius University
in Bratislava. Mr Makúch also sits on the editorial boards of several economic
journals. He is the author of numerous professional works published in Slovakia
and abroad.
Dubravko Mihaljek is Head of Macroeconomic Analysis in the Monetary
and Economic Department at the Bank for International Settlements. Prior
to this, Dr. Mihaljek was a sta member of the International Monetary
Fund (1990–1999) and Assistant Researcher in the Economics Institute,
Zagreb (1982–1989). He initially studied at the University of Zagreb and
subsequently obtained a master’s degree at the University of Minnesota and a
PhD in Economics at the University of Pittsburgh. He has published numerous
empirical and policy-oriented papers on macroeconomics, international
economics, banking and nance, transition economies and health care
nancing.
Dušan Mramor was Minister of Finance of the Republic of Slovenia at
the time of the seminar. He also served as Minister of Finance from 2002
to 2004. Dr. Mramor is currently a Full Professor of Finance in the Faculty
of Economics, University of Ljubljana. During his tenure at the University
of Ljubljana, he has served as Associate Dean and the Dean of the Faculty
of Economics and as Chairman of the Board of the University. He was
a Recurring Visiting Professor at the Central European University, and a
Research Associate and Visiting Scholar at the School of Business, Indiana
University. Currently, he is a Vice-President of the Board of European Institute
for Advanced Studies in Management in Belgium, a member of International
148 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Advisory Board of Maastricht University School of Business and Economics in
the Netherlands, and until August 2014 was a member of Initial Accreditation
Committee and European Advisory Committee of AACSB in the United
States. The Banker magazine selected Dr. Mramor as “European Finance
Minister of the Year 2016”.
Ľudovít Ódor is Deputy of the Network of EU Independent Fiscal
Institutions and a member of the Council for Budget Responsibility. After
graduating in Mathematics and Management from Comenius University, he
worked as a nancial market analyst for ČSOB bank and as an economist
with the Slovak Rating Agency (2001–2003). From 2003 to 2005, Mr Ódor
was the Chief Economist and Director of the Institute for Financial Policy
at the Ministry of Finance. He then served as a member of the Board of the
National Bank of Slovakia until September 2010, and subsequently as an
advisor to the prime minister and nance minister until 2012. Since 2016, he
is a Visiting Professor at the Central European University in Budapest. Mr
Ódor is the author of numerous publications, both in Slovakia and abroad,
and co-author of a number of reform projects, including the Constitutional
Act on Fiscal Responsibility.
Lucio R. Pench is Director for Fiscal Policy and Policy Mix in the Directorate-
General for Economic and Financial Aairs of the European Commission,
which he joined in 1989. In this capacity, he has served as the Commission’s
chief negotiator on the reform of the Stability and Growth Pact. His earlier
assignments include heading the scal policy and surveillance unit in the same
Directorate and a stint as adviser in the Group of Policy Advisers reporting to
the Commission President. His interests and publications focus on macro-scal
issues, including the relationship between policies and the EU institutional
frameworks. He holds a master’s degree in International Relations (economics
focus) from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy.
Javier J. Perez is Head of the Conjunctural Analysis Division at the
Directorate General of Economics, Statistics and Research of the Banco
de España. Mr Perez was previously in charge of the Fiscal Policies Unit
within the same Directorate General. Prior to joining the Banco de España
at the end of 2008, he served as Principal Economist in the Fiscal Policies
Division of the European Central Bank, as Senior Research Ocer at centrA
in Seville, and as Associate Professor at the Pablo de Olavide University in
Seville and Complutense University in Madrid (from which he holds a PhD in
Economics). He is a regular contributor to policy and academic workshops and
seminars, primarily in the elds of scal policies, public debt, and scal and
economic forecasting. In these elds, he has published extensively in national
149About the speakers
and international journals, such as Public Choice, Fiscal Studies, the Scandinavian
Journal of Economics, the Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, and the European
Journal of Political Economy, among others.
Steven Phillips is Advisor in the Monetary and Capital Markets Department
of the International Monetary Fund. He joined the IMF in 1991 and has
previously served as Chief of the Open-Economy Macroeconomics Division of
the Research Department as well as Chief of the Regional Economic Studies
Division of the Western Hemisphere Department. He has led IMF missions
to Chile, the Dominican Republic and Mexico, and also worked on Latvia
and Russia, among others. He holds a PhD in Economics from the University
of California at Berkeley.
Lars Rohde is Chairman of the Board of Governors of Danmarks
Nationalbank since February 2013. In this capacity, he is also a Governor of the
International Monetary Fund. From 1998 to 2013, he was CEO of the Danish
Labour Market Supplementary Pension Scheme. In the 1980s he held various
executive positions within Danish nancial institutions. He has also served
as a member of the Board of Copenhagen Stock Exchange, the Committee
on Corporate Governance in Denmark, the Board of Association of Danish
Mortgage Banks, as an expert member of the Swedish government commission
on National Pension Fund and as a member of Long Term Investors Council
for the World Economic Forum.
Gent Sejko is Governor of the Bank of Albania and Chairman of its
Supervisory Council since February 2015. He started his banking career in
1992 as Head of Credit Division of the National Commercial Bank. Thereafter,
he worked as an Inspector at the Supervision Department of the Bank of
Albania until 1998. Subsequently, he worked for Deloitte & Touche as senior
auditor and consultant and for the American Bank of Albania as Head of
Internal Audit and Compliance Division. In 2002, Mr. Sejko returned to the
Bank of Albania’s Supervision Department as Head of Division for on-site
examinations. He held a number of managing positions at Raieisen Bank
from during 2004 to 2010, and was the Deputy General Manager and Head
of Retail Department and Branches Network for Société Générale Albania
from 2010 to February 2015. Mr. Sejko graduated from the University of
Tirana in 1991 and earned a master’s degree in International Accounting and
Financial Management from the University of Glasgow in 1997.
Jan Smets is Governor of the National Bank of Belgium since March 2015.
Soon after graduating, he joined the National Bank of Belgium where he
worked for a number of years in the Research Department. From 1988 to 1994,
he worked for the federal Belgian government and later became head of the
150 Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
economic cabinet of the prime minister. In 1994, he returned to the National
Bank of Belgium to become Head of the Research Department. In 1999,
he was appointed member of the Board and at the same time also General
Commissioner for the introduction of the euro in Belgium. For 15 years, he
has been acting Chairman of the National High Council on Employment. He
has chaired the “Public sector borrowing requirements” section of the national
High Council of Finance for several years. As a governor of the central bank,
he occupies a number of functions in international and national nancial
organisations and institutions.
Vitas Vasiliauskas is Chairman of the Bank of Lithuania since April 2011.
Prior to this, Mr Vasiliauskas was a lawyer, specialising in nancial law, and
an associate partner at the law rm LAWIN Lideika, Petrauskas, Valiūnas ir
partneriai (2004–2011). Earlier, he was the Vice Minister of Finance of the
Republic of Lithuania (2001–2004), after being promoted from the position
of Director of the Tax Department, Ministry of Finance (1998–2001). Mr
Vitas Vasiliauskas started his career in the public sector as a lawyer and Head
of the Tax Recovery Division of the State Tax Inspectorate (1995–1998). He
completed his law studies at Vilnius University in 1996 and received his PhD
in Social Sciences (Law) in 2004. He has remained active in the academic
world throughout his career and is currently a Lecturer of the Chair of Public
Law of Vilnius University Faculty of Law (since 2010). Previously he was a
Lecturer of the Chair of Constitutional and Administrative Law (2004–2010)
and assistant of the Chair of State and Law Theory and History of Vilnius
University Faculty of Law (1997–2004) at Vilnius University Faculty of Law.
Boris Vujčić is Governor of the Croatian National Bank since July 2012. He
joined the central bank in 1997, and was Director of the Research Department
for three years before becoming Deputy Governor in 2000, a position to which
he was re-appointed in 2006. Mr Vujčić became an Associate Professor in the
Faculty of Economics of the University of Zagreb in 2003. He also teaches at
the Diplomatic Academy of the Croatian Ministry of Foreign Aairs in the
Department of Mathematics of the University of Zagreb. Mr Vujčić holds a
PhD in Economics from the University of Zagreb.
Nerses Yeritsyan is Deputy Chairman of the Central Bank of the Republic
of Armenia. His previous experience includes working at the Parliament of the
Republic of Armenia, the Central Bank of Armenia (CBA) and the Minister
of Economy of the Republic of Armenia. At the central bank, he successively
held the positions of Advisor to the Chairman, Head of Monetary Policy
Department, Member of the Board, Senior Advisor to the Chairman (Deputy
Chairman of the Managerial Board), and Acting Head of the Financial
151About the editors
Monitoring Center. He has also served as advisor to the Dutch Executive
Director at the International Monetary Fund. Dr. Yeritsyan holds a PhD in
Economics and is the author of several scientic articles.
About the editors
Boštjan Jazbec is Governor of the Bank of Slovenia since July 2013. He is
also a member of the Governing Council of the European Central Bank. Dr.
Jazbec has previously worked as a short-term consultant for the European
Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) and the World Bank in
Washington, DC. In July 2003, he was appointed to the Board of the Bank of
Slovenia and held this post until 2008. Thereafter, until June 2013, he worked
as a consultant to the International Monetary Fund at the central banks of
Kosovo and Suriname. He graduated from the University of Ljubljana and
continued his studies at the Central European University in Budapest and
Prague. After completing his PhD studies in Economics at the Institute for
Advanced Studies in Vienna, Dr. Jazbec defended his doctoral thesis on real
exchange rate determination in transition economies at the University of
Ljubljana.
Biswajit Banerjee is Chief Economist of the Bank of Slovenia since April
2014. He is also a member of the Monetary Policy Committee of the European
Central Bank. Dr. Banerjee is a former senior sta member of the International
Monetary Fund, where he led surveillance and programme missions to several
countries in central and southeastern Europe. He also previously taught at
Haverford College, the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, and
the University of Oxford. He has served as an external advisor to the Minister
of Finance of the Slovak Republic, and has conducted training courses in
nancial programming for senior government ocials of Bangladesh. Dr.
Banerjee received his doctorate in Economics from the University of Oxford,
which he attended as a Rhodes Scholar. He has numerous publications in
leading academic journals.
Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal
Policy Coordination
Edited by Boštjan Jazbec and Biswajit Banerjee
Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination
Monetary policy has become increasingly accommodative in response
to the global nancial crisis, relying on unconventional policies, such as
large-scale government bond purchases and negative interest rates in some
countries. Yet there is broad agreement that there are limits to the scope
of monetary policy actions and their eectiveness. Sustainable growth
and price stability will require a coherent, integrated policy strategy that
also includes contributions from scal and structural policies – as well as
appropriate policies to contain nancial risks.
This book contains the proceedings of the high-level seminar on
“Rethinking Monetary‒Fiscal Policy Coordination” organised by the
Bank of Slovenia and the International Monetary Fund on 19-20
May 2016 in Portorož, Slovenia. The seminar explored the thinking
of policymakers and academics on the roles and coordination of
monetary and scal policies in the European Union and elsewhere.
Three main topics were taken up in separate sessions: (i) principles and
practical experience in the coordination of monetary and scal policies;
(ii) scal policy implementation in the EU institutional framework and
implications for monetary policy; and (iii) conducting monetary policy
when scal space is limited.
Boštjan Jazbec is Governor and Biswajit Banerjee is Chief Economist
at the Bank of Slovenia, Ljubljana, Slovenia.
Proceedings of a seminar jointly organised by the
Bank of Slovenia and the International Monetary Fund
Rethinking Monetary–Fiscal Policy Coordination Edited by Boštjan Jazbec and Biswajit Banerjee
9 789616 960120
ISBN 978-961-6960-12-0
