Ekonomialariek segitzen dute errealitatea ukatzen

Bai, hola da eta ez soilik Euskal Herrian1.

Hemengo progreek Wolfgang Schäuble-k bezalaxe pentsatzen dute2.

Baina afera ez da etxekoen ezjakintasuna, oso nabaria eta hedatua dena berau. Kontua da ezjakintasunak erro sakonak dituela eta nonahi eta nolanahi hedatzen dela.

Izan ere,

(1) Oro har, ekonomialariek errealitatea bera ukatzen dute

Korronte nagusiko ekonomialariek plazaratzen dituzten modelo analitikoek ez daukate inongo zerikusirik errealitatearekin3.

Paul Davidson-ek aspaldian salatu zuen jarrera hori4.

(2) Are gehiago: zenbait Banku Zentralen mezuak okerrak dira erabat

Mitchell-i jarraituz5,

(a) Mainstream economists link the expansion of the money supply with accelerating inflation. It is the most intuitive part of the neo-liberal story and the one that resonates with the public

(b) .… the money multiplier mechanism, a basic element of mainstream monetary theory – and one of the most incorrect parts

(c) Students are introduced to the money multiplier early in their studies. It is an article of faith in mainstream thinking6

(d) the central bank will always supply the necessary reserves to ensure the financial system remains functional and cheques clear each day

(e) … banks do not lend out reserves and a particular bank’s ability to expand its balance sheet by lending is not constrained by the quantity of reserves it holds or any fractional reserve requirements that might be imposed by the central bank

(f) Loans create deposits, which are then backed by reserves after the fact

Baina Banku Zentral guztiak ez dira berdin ari7.

Izan ere, Ingalaterrako Bankuaren txostenak argi erakusten du joera aldaketa hori8.

Txostenaren bi emaitzak hauexek dira:

The reality of how money is created today differs from the description found in some economics textbooks:

Rather than banks receiving deposits when households save and then lending them out, bank lending creates deposits.

In normal times, the central bank does not fix the amount of money in circulation, nor is central bank money ‘multiplied up’ into more loans and deposits.

These conclusions are devastating for mainstream economics ...9

Antzeko ideia plazaratu zuen 2008an New York-eko Federal Reserve Bank delakoak10, merkataritza bankuen erreserbaz, bankuen arteko ordainketaz eta merkatuaz aritzen denean, banku zentrala azken mailegu emaile gisa (lender of last resort) arituz11.

Ingalaterrako Bankuak argi esplikatzen du erreserben kontu hori, multiplikatzaile teoria ukatuz eta Banku Zentralaren mailegu emaileko rola azpimarratuz12.

Afera, aldiz, hauxe da:

The question then is, why are students in our universities forced to learn material that has no foundation in the system they are purporting to understand? The answer is that the educational opportunity is replaced by a propaganda exercise to suit ideological agendas.”

(3) Ondorioa, baita euskal progresiarentzat ere

Mitchell-ek dioenez, nahiz eta mundu mailan deflazio joerak egon, korronte nagusiko ekonomialariek segitzen dute ulertu gabe zertan datzan afera, krisiaren hodeiak noiz desagertuko zain egonik eta zentzurik gabeko ohiko teoria kaskarrak oraindik aplikatu nahian.

(iv) Dakienak badaki, ez dakienak baleki

Euroguneari dagokionez ikasgai batzuk ikasi beharrezkoak dira.

Hona ikasgai garrantzitsu bat, Mitchell-en eskutik13, sektore pribatuaz, EBZ mailegu emaileaz, quantitative easing delakoaz eta politika mota horiek langabezian izan dezaketen eraginaz14.

Zoritxarrez, korronte nagusiko ekonomialariak politika monetarioan dute fedea, politika fiskal eraginkor eta sakona alboratuz15.

Inflazioa zero ingurukoa da, langabezia altu samarra egonez16. Alta, monetarismoa da nagusi eurogunean17.

Langabeziari dagokionez, EBZ-ren eginkizuna, aldiz, oso argi dago18.

Baina euroguneko korronte nagusiko ekonomialariak oso urrun daude politika fiskalaren eraginkortasun sakona ulertu ahal izateko. Nahiago dute beren ohiko eskematxoei eutsiz, eta politika monetarioan daukaten fedeaz aritzea.

Ondorioak guztiok jasaten ditugu.


1 Oraindik segitzen du nire harridurak Hamaika TBn entzundakoaz. Ikus Grezia dela eta, heterodoxia versus ortodoxia… eta Grezia dela eta, heterodoxia versus ortodoxia…(2): https://www.unibertsitatea.net/blogak/heterodoxia/2015/10/15/grezia-dela-eta-heterodoxia-versus-ortodoxia-2/.

3 Bill Mitchell-ek dioenez ( Ikus Economists remain in denial of reality: http://bilbo.economicoutlook.net/blog/?p=32683), “Mainstream economists do not consider culture, institutions, intimacy and other human realities important enough to include in their analytical frameworks. They produce analytical models which assume these things away as being of nuisance value only.

They produce models that generate predictions about human behaviour that have nothing to do with the essential drivers of that behaviour.

4 Mitchell-i jarraituz, “Post Keynesian economist Paul Davidson [in the book by Bell and Kristol The Crisis in Economic Theory, Basic Books, 1981, p.157] describes how mainstream economics uses methods and approaches that renders it unable to embrace real world problems:

There are certain purely imaginary intellectual problems for which general equilibrium models are well designed to provide precise answers (if anything really could). But this is much the same as saying that if one insists on analyzing a problem which has no real world equivalent or solution, it may be appropriate to use a model which has no real-world application. By the same token, if a model is designed specifically to deal with real-world situations it may not be able to handle purely imaginary problems.”

5 Ikus Central bank propaganda from Minneapolis: http://bilbo.economicoutlook.net/blog/?p=32688.

6 Honela segitzen du Mitchell-ek, “It is asserted, erroneously, that by manipulating the monetary base, the central bank can control the money supply. (…) Milton Friedman, the father of Monetarism, once said in relation to the US monetary system that: … the Federal Reserve System essentially determines the total quantity of money; that is to say, the number of dollars of currency and deposits available for the public to hold. Within very wide limits, it can make this total anything it wants it to be. (…) Unfortunately, like most aspects of the Monetarist doctrine, the theory doesn’t match the reality. The ‘monetary base’ is measured as the notes and coins in circulation or in bank vaults plus bank reserves held at the central bank. It is understood that central banks can add ‘money’ to the bank reserve accounts whenever they choose. After all, they can create money ‘out of thin air’.

7 Mitchell-en hitzez, “In recent years, in the face of all this hyperinflation angst, several central banks published articles which showed how far fetched the monetary theory is that is taught to students and espoused by mainstream economists and financial commentators. They showed that real world banking doesn’t operate in the way the textbooks claim.

8 Ingelesez, “Among the enlightening reports was the Bank of England article in the First-quarter edition of the 2014 Quarterly Bulletin – Money creation in the modern economy.”

9 Honela segitzen du: The Bank of England further notes that “in reality … commercial banks are the creators of deposit money … the reverse of the sequence typically described in textbooks” and that the “money multiplier theory … is not an accurate description of how money is created in reality”. These insights lead to the conclusion that “neither are reserves a binding constraint on lending, nor does the central bank fix the amount of reserves that are available”. In terms of the determinants of the broad money supply, the Bank of England ratifies the Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) argument that “lending creates deposits”, which then creates money. The Bank of England also highlighted the: … related misconception … that banks can lend out their reserves … Reserves can only be lent between banks … consumers do not have access … [to central bank reserve accounts].”

10 Ingelesez: “This insight is also confirmed in an interesting article published in September 2008 by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York in their Economic Policy Review entitled – Divorcing money from monetary policy.”

11 Ingelesez: “We learn that commercial banks require bank reserves for two main reasons. First, from time to time, central banks will impose reserve requirements, which means that the bank has to hold a certain non-zero volume of reserves at the central bank. Most nations only require the banks to keep their reserves in the black on a daily basis. Second, the FRNBY states that “reserve balances are used to make interbank payments; thus, they serve as the final form of settlement for a vast array of transactions”. There is daily uncertainty among banks surrounding the payments flows in and out as cheques are presented and other transactions between banks are accounted for. The banks can get funds from the other banks in the interbank market to cover any shortfalls, but also will choose to hold some extra reserves just in case. If all else fails the central bank maintains a role as lender of last resort, which means they will lend reserves on demand from the commercial banks to facilitate the payments system.”

12 Ingelesez: “When the central bank adds funds to these reserve accounts (for example, when conducting quantitative easing), the Bank of England tells us that:

the new reserves are not mechanically multiplied up into new loans and new deposits as predicted by the money multiplier theory.

The Bank of England also concludes that the existence of new reserves, even if they are well in excess of the banks’ requirements to operate an orderly clearing system, “do not, by themselves … change the incentives for the banks to create new broad money by lending.

Mitchell-en gehigarriak: 100-percent reserve banking and state banks; Building bank reserves will not expand credit eta Building bank reserves is not inflationary.

13 Ikus Eurozone, lessons have not been learned: http://bilbo.economicoutlook.net/blog/?p=32488.

14 Ingelesez: “The evidence is that the move will not lead to any significant increase in bank lending to the private sector. After all bank loans are not constrained by the volume of reserves that the banks have. Rather they are determined by the demand for loans by credit-worthy borrowers and with conditions so bleak in the Eurozone at present, that class of firm or person is rather scarce. It was expected that the ECB would also ramp up its qualitative easing program to around €80 billion per month. The ECB kept its current purchase program unchanged at around €60 per month, although it indicated it would maintain the program for at least a further six months and would broaden the bond categories that it would be purchasing. None of this is going to have any substantial effect on real output growth in the Eurozone and the evolution of the unemployment rate there.”

15 Ingelesez: “The quantitative easing program is an asset swap (reserves for bonds) and can only really impact upon aggregate spending via its effect on yields on the asset class being bought and then the associated decline in rates at those maturities for other investment assets. In other words, qualitative easing reduces long-term interest rates which may encourage investment if the cost of capital is the only difference between a project being profitable or not. The reality is that forward-looking expectations in the Eurozone remain highly pessimistic and the current capital stock is probably more than sufficient to meet the growth in sales and so there is little incentive to engage in large-scale capital investment projects at whatever cost of capital. It is for that reason that qualitative easing programs in the US, in the UK, in Japan, and now in the Eurozone failed to act as a broad stimulus for economic activity. There is some evidence that they stimulate certain asset markets but full employment depends upon growth in real goods and services not the growth in prices of real estate, for example.”

16 Ingelesez: “The fact that the inflation rate is skating around zero at present and unemployment is stuck around 10.7 per cent is indicative of the point that Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) proponents make about the ineffectiveness of monetary policy interventions.”

17 Ingelesez: “Quite simply, the Eurozone is relying on the wrong policy tools to stimulate its stagnant economy and that reliance is indicative of the stubborn denial that comes with neo-liberal Groupthink. The policymakers are so stuck in their Monetarist-type thinking that they have placed their most effective policy tool – that is, fiscal policy – in a straitjacket and continue to play around with the impotent monetary policy tools at their disposal.”

18 Ingelesez: “The ECB would make an almost instant contribution to growth if it posted out a ‘package of euros’ to every unemployed person in Europe. That fiscal intervention would immediately stimulate sales and possibly provide the basis for some crowding in of private investment spending.”

Iruzkinak (1)

  • joseba

    Bundesbank corrects textbook mistakes on money creation, rejects 100%-money

    https://rwer.wordpress.com/2017/05/11/bundesbank-corrects-textbook-mistakes-on-money-creation-rejects-100-money/

    “In the April-edition of their monthly report, the Bundesbank has belatedly joined the Bank of England in explicitly stating that the treatment of banks and money creation in most textbooks is wrong: banks are not intermediaries; they create money ex-nihilo. This helps the Bundesbank to reject criticism that central banks are currently “printing” too much money. At the same time, the Bundesbank rejects the proposal of 100%-money, i.e. bank deposits fully backed by central bank money.
    So far, the Bundesbank has only published an English summary of the article “How money is created”, originally written in German (and a French summary). Once the article is available in full translation, I will write a bit more about the (mostly faulty) arguments of the Bundesbank against 100%-money.
    The most important sentences regarding money creation are already there in the summary, though:
    The majority of the money supply is made up of book money, which is created through transactions between banks and domestic customers. Sight deposits are an example of book money: sight deposits are created when a bank grants a credit or purchases an asset and credits the corresponding amount to the customer’s bank account in return. This means that banks can create book money just by making an accounting entry. This refutes a popular misconception that banks act simply as intermediaries at the time of lending – ie that banks can only grant credit using funds placed with them previously as deposits by other customers.”

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