National Institute Economic Review

GDP is forecast to grow by 1.7 per cent this year and by 1.9 per cent next year.

Forecast for world GDP growth in 2017 has been revised up to 3.6 per cent, which would be the fastest growth in six years. Growth projections for 2018 and the medium term are unchanged, at 3.6 and 3.4 per cent, respectively. Inflation forecast has nevertheless generally been revised down slightly.

The paper looks at the ‘new normal’ in so many of the world's central banks, and specifically the UK. It examines the position of the monetary policy framework, instrument settings, the underlying models, unconventional policy measures, real interest rates, and the interface with macroprudential policy. It explores both the advantages and challenges involved in any move to return towards pre-crisis arrangements, and offers suggestions for possible ways in which current policy dilemmas might be resolved.

A defining feature of (at least) the last three general elections has been the emphasis placed on each political party's fiscal credibility and their ability to deliver “sound public finances”. Applying the logic of household book-keeping, balancing the fiscal budget is said to capture such soundness. There is, however, little evidence that a balanced budget is necessarily sound. Instead, the evolution of public finances depends on (1) both the fiscal choices made on the level of spending and taxation, (2) the underlying growth of the economy which depends on far more than the fiscal decisions, and (3) interest rates on government debt and the financing needs of the government. As the economic situation changes, so too does the likely path of debt to GDP and hence the possible fiscal options open to a country. Sticking to the soundbite of “sound finances” has often distracted from the underlying menu of political choices and as such is a disruptive narrative in UK economics today.

Economists understand that a fit for purpose policy regime requires a reliable general equilibrium model of the system in question and a well specified description of the objectives that the policymaker is trying to pursue. The current financial stability regime has neither and without these critical foundations the regime is fundamentally fragile and incomplete. There is no anchor on the conduct of policy, an absence in genuine accountability and, as a result, reputational risks for policy institutions.

The financial crisis has led to a change in the mix of capital and labour employed in the UK and a sharp decline in total factor productivity. This has meant that labour productivity has not recovered to any great degree since the financial crisis. We explore the role of overall and sectoral productivity in explaining the fall in labour productivity, but also question the extent to which productivity in the service sector may be measured with error. We outline the links between a constrained financial sector and a fall in overall productivity – in which intangible capital seems to play an important role – and illustrate how a financial sector providing intermediate services may act to amplify the business cycle impetus from a total factor productivity shock within the context of a calibrated model.

While there may be an important, but transitory, cyclical component in the poor performance of the past decade, we will emphasise the secular forces: the impact of demographic structure and innovation. We draw on the empirical and theoretical work reported in Aksoy, Basso, Smith and Grasl (2015), ABSG, about the impact of changes in demographic structure on macroeconomic outcomes. This suggests that changes in age profile not only have significant implications for savings, investment, real interest rates and growth but also for innovation. The size of the effects seems plausible. For instance, if in 2015 the UK had the 1970 age structure, it would have added 0.68 percentage points to the long-run annual growth rate. The model suggests that the population ageing predicted for the next decades will tend to reduce output growth and real interest rates across OECD countries.

This paper argues that the Bank of England's independence in monetary policy has been compromised as a result of quantitative easing (QE) and makes practical suggestions for restoring it as far as possible, by transferring the gilts that the Bank has bought to the Debt Management Office of the Treasury and thereby shrinking the Bank's balance sheet. The paper discusses the problems that will arise when QE is unwound and suggests that they would be less intractable if the unwinding were managed by the Debt Management Office.

I discuss six tools available to monetary policy makers. Three of these have been used since the inception of central banking. Three are new and were introduced in the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis. I argue that, when the UK Monetary Policy Committee raises the interest rate, it should maintain a large balance sheet that consists of both risky and safe assets. Further, the Bank should trade the risk composition of its balance sheet to promote the stability of asset prices.