Saturday, March 16, 2013

Lord Keynes on how Japan avoided the Great Depression

In other words, Japan was using a policy we would now associate with Modern Monetary Theory (MMT). From November 1932, the government’s deficit was financed by issuing bonds directly to the Bank of Japan, and then later the Bank sold these bonds to private banks. Not only was there no hyperinflation, but no significant inflation.
Social Decmocracy for the 21st Century
Takahashi Korekiyo and Fiscal Stimulus in Japan in the 1930s
Lord Keynes
(h/t Philip Pilkington on FB)

Japan got it right then, but now, not so much as they focus on monetary policy rather than fiscal.


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