Unconventional Economic Wisdom
Le triomphant retour de John Maynard Keynes
Joseph E. Stiglitz
|
|
|
|
NEW YORK – Nous voilà tous keynésiens. Même la droite américaine a rejoint le camp keynésien, avec un enthousiasme non contenu d’un degré qui aurait été inimaginable autrefois.
Pour ceux d'entre nous qui revendiquent un lien avec la tradition keynésienne, nous vivons un moment de triomphe, après une traversée du désert qui a duré plus de trente ans. Dans un sens, ce qui se produit maintenant est une victoire de la raison et de l'évidence sur l'idéologie et les intérêts.
La théorie économique avait depuis longtemps expliqué pourquoi des marchés non soumis à des restrictions ne se corrigeaient pas d’eux-mêmes, pourquoi la régulation était nécessaire et pourquoi le gouvernement avait un rôle important à jouer dans l'économie. Pourtant, d’aucuns, en particulier les personnes qui travaillent sur les marchés financiers, ont incité à un type de « fondamentalisme de marché ». Les politiques malavisées qui en ont découlé – soutenues notamment par des membres de l'équipe économique du président Américain élu Barack Obama – avaient imposé des coûts énormes aux pays en développement. La révélation est survenue lorsque les coûts de ces politiques ont commencé à peser également sur les bourses américaines et d'autres pays industriels avancés.
Selon Keynes, les marchés ne s'autorégulent pas ; qui plus est, en cas d'important déclin économique, il y a de fortes chances pour que la politique monétaire soit inefficace. Il était nécessaire d'adopter une politique budgétaire – mais toutes ces politiques ne se valent pas. Dans l'Amérique d'aujourd'hui, avec un surplus de dette des ménages et de fortes incertitudes, les réductions d'impôts seront certainement inutiles (comme dans les années 90 au Japon). En effet, une grande partie, si ce n'est la plus grande partie, des réductions d'impôts américaines de février dernier est partie dans l'épargne.
Avec l'énorme dette que laisse derrière lui le gouvernement Bush, les États-Unis devront être particulièrement motivés pour stimuler au mieux la dépense du moindre dollar. Les séquelles d’un investissement insuffisant dans la technologie et l'infrastructure, notamment favorables à l'environnement, et le fossé qui se creuse entre les riches et les pauvres appellent une harmonie entre dépenses de court terme et perspectives de long terme.
Pour cela, il faut restructurer les programmes en matière d'impôts et de dépenses publiques. Il est possible de stimuler l’économie, de réduire le déficit et l'inégalité sociale par la baisse des impôts des pauvres et l’augmentation des prestations de chômage, parallèlement à la hausse des impôts des riches. Réduire les dépenses pour la guerre en Irak et augmenter celles pour l'éducation peut en outre accroître simultanément la production à court et à long termes et limiter le déficit.
Keynes s'inquiétait du piège des liquidités – de l'incapacité des autorités monétaires à provoquer une montée du crédit pour donner un coup de fouet à l’économie. Ben Bernanke, président de la Réserve fédérale américaine, s’est efforcé d’éviter que la faute ne retombe sur la Fed, qu’on l’accuse d’avoir aggravé le déclin (comme on l’a accusée d’être responsable de la grande dépression), qui s’accompagne généralement d’une contraction de la masse monétaire et de l'effondrement de banques.
Toutefois, il convient de lire l'histoire et la théorie avec prudence : préserver les institutions financières n'est pas une fin en soi, mais un moyen. C'est le flux de crédit qui importe. La raison pour laquelle la faillite des banques durant la grande dépression était importante, c’est qu’elles décidaient en partie de la qualité des emprunteurs potentiels : elles étaient les gardiennes des informations nécessaires au maintien du flux de crédit.
Le système financier américain a nettement changé depuis les années 30. Nombre de grandes banques américaines sont passées du « marché du prêt » au « marché de la vente ». Elles se sont concentrées sur l'achat d'actifs, les ont reconditionnés puis vendus, tout en établissant un record d'incompétence en matière d’évaluation des risques et de contrôle de la capacité de remboursement. Des centaines de milliards ont été dépensés pour préserver les institutions en dysfonctionnement. Mais rien n'a été fait pour revoir leurs structures perverses d’incitation, qui encouragent les comportements peu perspicaces et la prise de risques excessive. Avec des récompenses privées en net contraste avec les retours sociaux, il n'est pas surprenant que la quête de l'intérêt personnel (avidité) ait eu des conséquences si destructives d'un point de vue social. Quand aux intérêts des actionnaires, ils n’ont même pas été servis correctement.
Pendant ce temps, presque rien n'est fait pour aider les banques qui se sont efforcées de faire ce que toute banque est censée faire : prêter de l'argent et évaluer les capacités de remboursement.
Le gouvernement fédéral a endossé des milliards de milliards de dollars de passif et de risques. En venant au secours du système financier, rien moins que dans la politique budgétaire, il importe de se soucier de ce que nous obtenons pour notre argent. Autrement, le déficit – qui a doublé en huit ans – se creusera encore bien davantage.
En septembre, il était question que le gouvernement récupère son argent, avec des intérêts. Avec l'augmentation rapide du coût du renflouement, il est de plus en plus évident que tout cela ne sera finalement qu’un autre exemple de marché financier où les risques sont mal évalués – comme ce fut le cas à maintes reprises ces dernières années. Les conditions des sauvetages de Bernanke-Paulson étaient désavantageuses pour les contribuables. Malgré leur ampleur, il est incroyable que ces sauvetages aient peu fait pour raviver l'emprunt.
L’incitation néolibérale à la dérégulation a profité à certains. Les marchés financiers se sont bien sortis de la libéralisation des marchés des capitaux. Il est probable que laisser l'Amérique spéculer et vendre des produits financiers à haut risque dans le monde entier ait favorisé les intérêts de ses sociétés, même si cela a imposé d’importants coûts à d'autres.
Le risque aujourd’hui, c’est que les doctrines keynésiennes soient utilisées à mauvais escient pour servir à nouveau partie des mêmes intérêts. Les personnes qui ont incité à la dérégulation il y a dix ans ont-elles tiré des leçons ou encourageront-elles simplement des réformes superficielles – le minimum requis pour justifier des sauvetages de millions de milliards de milliards de dollars ? Y a-t-il eu un changement de fond ou simplement de stratégie ? Après tout, dans le contexte actuel, la poursuite de la politique keynésienne semble même plus profitable que celle du fondamentalisme de marché.
Il y a dix ans, au moment de la crise financière asiatique, il était souvent question de la nécessité de réformer l'architecture financière mondiale. Peu a été fait. Il est impératif de ne pas simplement résoudre la crise actuelle, mais surtout d'entreprendre des réformes de longue durée indispensables à l’instauration d’une économie mondiale plus stable, prospère et équitable.
Joseph E. Stiglitz, lauréat du « Prix Nobel » d’économie en 2001, est professeur d’économie à l’université de Columbia et co-auteur, avec Linda Bilmes, de The Three Trillion Dollar War: The True Costs of the Iraq Conflict.
Copyright: Project Syndicate, 2008.
www.project-syndicate.org
Traduit de l’anglais par Magali Adams
You might also like to read more from Joseph E. Stiglitz or return to our home page.
|
|
alycie 11:25 14 Dec 08
Please look at Portoalegre and how they decide on their own priorities.
bri 11:29 15 Dec 08
"Lowering taxes on the poor and raising unemployment benefits while simultaneously increasing taxes on the rich can stimulate the economy, reduce the deficit, and reduce inequality."
That's what we do in Canada and our per capita income is 30% below US per capita income.
"Have those who pushed deregulation ten years ago learned their lesson?"
Fannie and Freddie were government regulation failures. What about the wonderful Sarbanes-Oxley regulation? Another regulatory failure. Regulators are like traffic cops: They always show up after the accident and make things worse for those not involved.
"The moment of enlightenment came only when those policies also began inflicting costs on the US and other advanced industrial countries. "
A pesky fact, US per capita income will be higher in 2008 than in any other year in history.
Prof Stiglitz is giant in the economics profession for proving theoretically intriguing exceptions rather than general rules. It is the general rules that always trip him up in the policy making arena.
demandside 07:37 16 Dec 08
Keynes was worried about a liquidity trap – the inability of monetary authorities to induce an increase in the supply of credit in order to raise the level of economic activity. US Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke has tried hard to avoid having the blame fall on the Fed for deepening this downturn in the way that it is blamed for the Great Depression, famously associated with a contraction of the money supply and the collapse of banks.
And yet one should read history and theory carefully: preserving financial institutions is not an end in itself, but a means to an end. It is the flow of credit that is important, and the reason that the failure of banks during the Great Depression was important is that they were involved in determining creditworthiness; they were the repositories of information necessary for the maintenance of the flow of credit.
One of the things that is both amazing and revolting about the current policy response is the actions of the Fed. With more than a year's lead time and with confidence born of years of study, Bernanke applied his monetary remedies .... to no effect. The crash occurred. The only change in the Fed chairman has been an increase in the fever with which he applies the wrong medicine.
As Keynes said, paraphrasing, expansionary monetary policy is like buying a larger belt in hopes of getting fat.
His ass-backwards means of stabilizing housing was for too long attempting to create a credit environment which would somehow reflate the housing bubble. Too late he came to the table of stabilizing housing markets by stabilizing housing prices.
But the main point is that he, as you point out here, attempted to prop up the banks in hopes the banking function would be stabilized. It is not these decrepit and defunct institutions that are needed, it is the function of banking. We need a new bridge, not a multi-trillion dollar prop up of the broken one.
demandside 07:38 16 Dec 08
"Keynes was worried about a liquidity trap – the inability of monetary authorities to induce an increase in the supply of credit in order to raise the level of economic activity. US Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke has tried hard to avoid having the blame fall on the Fed for deepening this downturn in the way that it is blamed for the Great Depression, famously associated with a contraction of the money supply and the collapse of banks.
"And yet one should read history and theory carefully: preserving financial institutions is not an end in itself, but a means to an end. It is the flow of credit that is important, and the reason that the failure of banks during the Great Depression was important is that they were involved in determining creditworthiness; they were the repositories of information necessary for the maintenance of the flow of credit. "
One of the things that is both amazing and revolting about the current policy response is the actions of the Fed. With more than a year's lead time and with confidence born of years of study, Bernanke applied his monetary remedies .... to no effect. The crash occurred. The only change in the Fed chairman has been an increase in the fever with which he applies the wrong medicine.
As Keynes said, paraphrasing, expansionary monetary policy is like buying a larger belt in hopes of getting fat.
His ass-backwards means of stabilizing housing was for too long attempting to create a credit environment which would somehow reflate the housing bubble. Too late he came to the table of stabilizing housing markets by stabilizing housing prices.
But the main point is that he, as you point out here, attempted to prop up the banks in hopes the banking function would be stabilized. It is not these decrepit and defunct institutions that are needed, it is the function of banking. We need a new bridge, not a multi-trillion dollar prop up of the broken one.
tvselvakumaran 12:19 20 Dec 08
Some perspectives on the relevance of John Maynard Keynes to the modern economy:
1) Consumerism: Keynes may be considered as one of the first intellectuals to have understood the meaning of the new age of consumerism in the 20th century. Throughout the Renaissance period, and even leading up to the early 20th century, the Western liberal tradition relied heavily on the ideals of the Protestant Reformation. The influence of these ideas in economics can be seen in the writings of Max Weber. In this worldview, pious thrift and delayed gratification formed the foundation of people's economic outlook. It was in this economic environment that Keynes advocated a consumerist (or even hedonistic) freedom to be able to stimulate demand in an advanced industrial economy. From that brave new world that contemplated releasing a much self-denied consumer from thrift and delayed gratification, we have come a long way eighty years later, where consumers are now so much immersed in instant gratification that they simply can't stop consuming even if they realize that they are neck-deep in debt.
2) Deficit financing: The free market knows no yesterdays, nor any tomorrows. It is relentlessly focused on the present. Of course, one may purchase insurance and future contracts to safeguard oneself against the vagaries of the future behavior of the market. But one would be doing that based on information that one has from outside the market framework. The market mechanism itself does not guarantee anything other than a random walk of price movements. While there are many advantages to this quality of the market, the single major disadvantage is that it does not reflect normal economic activity accurately. Sure enough, changes in economic activity can be sudden and random, but usually a nation's economy has some continuity to its functioning, and based on this assumption, economic decisions are often made looking into the future. Investments on raw materials, inventory management, extension of credit to consumers, time value of money, experimenting with new technology, R & D, hiring new employees are some examples where the trust in our ability to gauge the future is crucial. Thus there is some role for another institution like a central bank or the state to step in to ensure that the market mechanism, in its pre-occupation with the present, does not get too much out-of-touch with reality. In fact, when there is a severe downturn, a central bank's changes in interest rates or printing money could be insufficient, and the state needs to provide substantial budgetary support (overlooking any concerns about fiscal deficits in the short-term) to a market-based economy. This is the policy prescription of Keynesianism when the economy is experiencing seriously difficult conditions.
Provided that a group of experts can peek into the future and see some socio-economic facts that the market appears to be obviously missing, then there is some justification to take corrective action. However, there is no provision in Keynesian theory to release trillion after trillion in dollars into the national economy with no clear understanding about what the problem is. This approach of throwing the kitchen-sink could lead to massive mis-allocations of capital, rampant corruption and cronyism, which seems to be what is actually happening now. Moreover, out-of-control spending, and announcements of drastic changes in policies, by the central bank and the treasury department could prevent private capital from entering the market. But most importantly, the implication for the global economy with such massive expansion of money would definitely be detrimental, because the dollar is widely used as a reserve currency, as a safe store of value.
3) Market failures: Keynesian propensity to focus on market failures misses out on what seems to be a really important success story of the market mechanism. Unlike the oil shocks of 1973 and 1979, Western economies have successfully thwarted the negative effects of the sudden spikes in oil prices in recent years. The oil producing countries tripled the price of a barrel of crude oil during 1972-75 and then tripled it again during 1976-80. These oil shocks were among the main reasons why the American economy went through a prolonged period of stagnation and inflation in the 1970s. Similarly, in recent years, betting that the fast growing emerging economies like China would provide effective competition for oil-demand against the West, the oil producing countries took to another round of oil price hikes. Between 2002 and 2008, the price of a barrel of crude oil shot up from $23 to over $150. However, when the stock markets, financial markets and the real estates crashed in America, there was a simultaneous crash in the markets in Europe and Asia. This made the high oil prices unsustainable and they have crashed to below $40 in recent days. This crash in oil prices has shown that the advanced economies have shifted, in the last 30 years, to Services, Information and Innovation as the sources of economic value, rather than Manufacturing. Moreover, it has demonstrated that the world economy is not willing to put a high value on commodities, ahead of human capital, modern political systems and the rule of law.
This success of the world markets in thwarting the oil cartels did not come about through any interference from the central bank or the state. In fact, there has been a change in the methodology of measuring inflation in recent years. Central banks now remove food and energy prices and focus on 'core inflation'. They consider spikes in oil prices and food prices as something exogenous to the national economic system. As a result, they did not take any significant steps to counter the oil price hikes of recent years. In fact, they were quick to take advantage of the fall -- the US Federal Reserve cited the fall in oil prices as an indication of the waning of inflationary forces and cut interest rates much further than it would have done otherwise. Similarly, the governments in the advanced countries did not make substantial efforts to promote alternative energies. They kept dragging their feet on this issue, favouring the big oil corporations. So, it was solely through the work of the markets that the efforts of the oil cartels to hold the world economy to ransom has been thwarted. It may be noted here in passing that high volatility in the markets appears to be one of the mechanisms that helped to dismantle the oil prices.
4) Technology and innovation: Keynes did not have any penetrating insights about technology, in contrast to the works of famous economists like Adam Smith, Karl Marx and John Kenneth Galbraith. In his oft-quoted example on the pin factory, Adam Smith illustrated how division of labor in carrying out a technological process could lead to vast increases in the productivity of the laborers. Karl Marx wrote extensively about the negative impact that technological progress had on the poorer sections of society. John Kenneth Galbraith analyzed systematically how the nature of technological changes in the industrial economies was closely related to the organization of working people as large corporations, and how these forms of organization affected the performance of the economy.
In contrast, Keynesian theory seems to be an abstract theoretical edifice on capitalism, which is self-referential, and lays emphasis on logical consistency and precision. This was part of the larger movement among 20th century economists to increasingly use complicated mathematical language in their research papers. Technology and innovation are assumed to be exogenous to economic theory, and these two phenomenon impact the economy in whatever way they do so. Their influence is only measured posteriori through empirical means and used to explain past events. For example, Alan Greenspan used productivity gains, that could be identified in economic data, as an explanation for the stock market boom in the mid-90s. There is no theoretical framework in modern economics for explaining technology and innovation in a coherent manner, something that Keynesian theory would not be able to rectify.
5) Remains of empires: Keynes seems to have had a deep understanding for people's sense of justice. Indeed, in his "Economic Consequences of the Peace", he was able to foresee that the heavy war indemnities that the Allies had forced on Germany at the end of the First World War was unjust and it would lead to hyperinflation in Germany. However, by and large, Keynesian policies are a sort-of ad hoc prescriptions for the advanced industrial economies, without any broader intellectual framework (unlike Adam Smith who had much to say about international trade and technology, or Karl Marx who had much to say about social issues and history). After the Second World War, Keynes was looking at a world that had emerged from the remains of empires. Keynes was the main architect of the Bretton Woods institutions -- the IMF and the World Bank, and their functioning in contemporary world would leave no doubt that the concerns of empires weighed more in Keynes' mind, when he was helping draft the rules & bylaws of these institutions, much more than any liberal or social agenda.
This was the weakest link in Keynesian theory. American people who saw themselves historically as fighting for freedom from the British empire would not take easily to Keynes' prescription of state intervention. In contrast, Milton Friedman's libertarian agenda which minimized the role of the state struck a deep chord among Americans. In this context, it is of great concern that the new economic team of the President-elect Barack Obama does not include Professor Joseph Stiglitz who is the only serious economist that has a deep grasp of the new global order. Fifty three years after the end of the Second World War, the concepts of the nation-state and democracy have proved to be the only robust frameworks for representing the aspiration of people around the world. Thinking in terms of empires and realpolitik is regressive. Most leading economists would just like to implement a laundry list of changes to IMF and World Bank, and continue with business-as-usual. They don't have the professional credibility nor sufficient understanding that is required for America to benefit from the new equitable world order. Only Professor Joseph Stiglitz has demonstrated that ability through his books, "Making Globalization Work", "The Roaring Nineties", "Globalization and its Discontents" and "Free Trade for All".
Frank 06:11 26 Dec 08
bri is completely wrong. If Canada has a lower GDP per capita than US is not a problem of the Stiglitz´proposals on taxes an unemployment insurance. The truly assesment of bri is that US is a model of growth (because there are very few countries with such a big GDP -per capita) but when the proposals are to combat the income inequality in a country with more serious problems in this area than CAnada.
The doubtful fact per capita GDP will be higher in US is not a reason to believe that is not costful for US, it is trmeodously costful for US, I mean, have you read the same newspapers that all in the world?
Stiglitz is being motivated for general facts around the world: poverty and deep inequality, and he is right when he says that the Tequila crises, Asian crises, Rusian crises and their effects around the developing world were not a problem for the financial system, now a financial turmoil in developed world is changing the opinions. The unfairness is evident
fujimoto 02:51 29 Dec 08
regulation and government are necessary evil when it comes to preserving the rule of law, private property and providing public services. i don't want to bargain with doctors about the price of surgery if i'm bleeding.
however, when it comes to the rest, to say that markets failed is wrong too. RIGGED markets failed. Scholes' "financial innovation", nothing more than abuse of the ever imperfect regulation, failed. if you want to set the record straight, let's first try to:
- banish the Fed, whose regulation of key input, price of money, got us into this hole
- banish the credit rating agencies. their idiotic or corrupt incompetence has exposed millions of hard working people to losses of their savings
- banish Fannie Mae's and Freddie Mac's of this world. what was their purpose again? how would a housing subsidy to the poor not achieve the same goal without this massive blow up.
- banish fractional reserve banking. greenspan puts and FDIC guarantees is why the people don't discriminate between the IndyMacs and HSBC of the world anymore.
Too many groups are claiming the "I told you so" prize. Unfortunately Keynesians are the ones who are going to win. Because when it comes to the rich and mighty, they are "all Keynesians now", since that's how they bail out their status quo.
mshotar 11:28 01 Jan 09
Should not we allow some time before judging the Bernanke-Paulson bailouts?
ShalomHamou 04:33 05 Jan 09
Sorry, Chairman Ben S. Bernanke, But Quantitative Easing Won't Work.
In a Liquidity Trap although Saving (S) is abnormally high investment (I) is next to 0.
Hence, the Keynesian paradigm I = S is not verified.
The purpose of Quantitative Easing being to lower the yield on long-term savings and increase liquidity it doesn't create $1 of investment.
In a Liquidity Trap the last thing the Market needs is liquidity.
Quantitative Easing does diminish the yield on long-term US Treasury debt but lowers marginally, if at all, the asked yield on long-term savings.
Those purchases maintain the demand for long-term asset in an unstable equilibrium.
When this desequilibrium resolves the Market turns chaotic.
This and other issues are explored in my tract:
A Specific Application of Employment, Interest and Money
Plea for a New World Economic Order
Abstract:
This tract makes a critical analysis of credit based, free market economy, Capitalism, and proves that its dysfunctions are the result of the existence of credit.
It shows that income / wealth disparity, cause and consequence of credit and of the level of long-term interest-rates, is the first order hidden variable, possibly the only one, of economic development.
It solves most of the puzzles of macro economy: among which Unemployment, Business Cycles, Under Development, Trade Deficits, International Division of Labour, Stagflation, Greenspan Conundrum, Deflation and Keynes' Liquidity Trap...
It shows that no fiscal or monetary policy, including the barbaric Quantitative Easing will get us out of depression.
A Credit Free, Free Market Economy will correct all of those dysfunctions.
The alternative would be, on the long run, to wait for the physical destruction (through war or rust) of most of our productive assets. It will be at a cost none of us can afford to pay.
A Specific Application of Employment, Interest and Money
http://www.17-76.net/interest.html
Press release of my open letter to Chairman Ben S. Bernanke:
Sorry, Chairman Ben S. Bernanke, But Quantitative Easing Won't Work.
http://www.prlog.org/10162465.html
Yours Sincerely,
Shalom P. Hamou
Chief Economist & Master Conductor
1776 - Annuit Cœptis.
alexferro 11:22 14 Dec 08
"Market fundamentalism": Is that like: Sacrificing work pay on a cross of derivatives, or the "cojones" whims of three mid-llevel japanese auto execs meeting in Kyodo over lunch? And you suspect little will be done this time about as well. "A more stable and prosperous and equitable global economy."