Saturday, April 28, 2012

Fisher dynamics revisited

When neo hicksians of the monetary policy cyclopian variety like gentle Ben and Paul the rug rat Circa. 2000 ie the era of japan bashing and superior posing of policy Rx's They attack the so called liquidity trap state of the market economy Thru lowering the real interest rate when now with a system in LT They can no longer lower the nominal rate Once all intertemporal securities with a fixed nominal value Have a zero rate the burden of new debt can't be nominally lower In a rationed credit system except by changing the term structure And of course the amount available on credit lines The resort is a direct attack of the real value of existing debt itself since simply recycling existing debt can't any longer reduce the de t burden beyond zero Apart from lengthening the term of repayment or offering no payment initial periods The only way to further reduce the burden of debt in a slump Is to rev up inflation by devaluations and if that isn't acceptable By some how changing inflational expectations This is pure reverse fisher effect sort of a back end to pigou effect But regardless what are the dynamics of this route even if it succeeds in changing inflationary expectations And how does this process and policy compare with the straight out deficit spending and tax holiday approach Conjecture The back up version of pigou would be far slower