Bericht vom 10. Oktober 2008
Rescuing our jobs and savings: What G7/8 leaders can do to solve the global credit crisis
A VoxEU.org Publication
Edited by Barry Eichengreen and Richard Baldwin
10. Oktober 2008
We are in the throes of what is almost certainly the most serious economic and financial crisis of our lifetimes. The crisis is no longer a US crisis or even a US and European crisis; it is a global crisis. It has spread from Wall Street to Main Street. It is not just investment portfolios and retirement accounts but jobs that are now at risk. There is a need for urgent action. The policy response needs to be decisive. It needs to be global. The stakes could not be higher.
Global economic and financial leaders are convening this weekend in Washington DC for the annual meetings of the IMF and World Bank. G7/8 finance ministers will meet Friday on the sidelines of the Fund/Bank meetings to craft their response. The global financial community will assemble the next day at IMF headquarters. Unfortunately, it is not clear that they have a clue of what to do.
With this sense of urgency in mind, we have assembled a group of leading economists to offer priorities for crisis response. This is not a homogenous collection of experts. The contributors are from different continents and different schools of thought. What emerges is a remarkable concensus on essentials:
The G7/8 leaders need to act this week. They must embrace a concrete plan; the usual 'we shall cooperate' press release will not be enough to restore confidence and avoid further damage to jobs and companies. The UK's plan would be a reasonable point of departure. All authors agreed that the plan should include recapitalisation of the banks, many argued for government guarantees, and some pushed for additional coordinated macroeconomic stimulus.
The contributions are brought together in an ebook available to download for free at
http://www.voxeu.org/index.php?q=node/2327
List of contributors:
Alberto Alesina, Charles Calomiris, Roger Craine, Stijn Claessens, J Bradford DeLong, Douglas Diamond, Barry Eichengreen, Daniel Gros, Luigi Guiso, Anil K Kashyap, Marco Pagano, Avinash Persaud, Richard Portes, Raghuram G Rajan, Guido Tabellini, Charles Wyplosz and Klaus Zimmermann