Leaving the Euro: a Practical Guide
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The Eurozone: Piecemeal Approach to an Optimum Currency Area
A Service of Leibniz-Informationszentrum econstor Wirtschaft Leibniz Information Centre Make Your Publications Visible. zbw for Economics Handler, Heinz Working Paper The Eurozone: Piecemeal Approach to an Optimum Currency Area WIFO Working Papers, No. 446 Provided in Cooperation with: Austrian Institute of Economic Research (WIFO), Vienna Suggested Citation: Handler, Heinz (2013) : The Eurozone: Piecemeal Approach to an Optimum Currency Area, WIFO Working Papers, No. 446, Austrian Institute of Economic Research (WIFO), Vienna This Version is available at: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/128970 Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen: Terms of use: Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Documents in EconStor may be saved and copied for your Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden. personal and scholarly purposes. Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle You are not to copy documents for public or commercial Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich purposes, to exhibit the documents publicly, to make them machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen. publicly available on the internet, or to distribute or otherwise use the documents in public. Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, If the documents have been made available under an Open gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort Content Licence (especially Creative Commons Licences), you genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. may exercise further usage rights as specified in the indicated licence. www.econstor.eu ÖSTERREICHISCHES INSTITUT FÜR WIRTSCHAFTSFORSCHUNG WORKING PAPERS The Eurozone: Piecemeal Approach to an Optimum Currency Area Heinz Handler 446/2013 The Eurozone: Piecemeal Approach to an Optimum Currency Area Heinz Handler WIFO Working Papers, No. -
Wolfson Economics Prize 2014
WOLFSON ECONOMICS PRIZE 2014 Charthills Green – a Garden City in the Garden of England. Chris Blundell Final submission, August 2014 0 © Charthills Green Ltd Photograph taken by author in area adjoining proposed development of SE Maidstone Garden City: Wolfson Economics Prize MMXIV Secondary Submission: Chris Blundell Contents Tables ............................................................................................................................ iii Figures ............................................................................................................................ iv Abbreviations .................................................................................................................. vi 1. Non-Technical Summary .............................................................................................. 2 2. Introduction. ................................................................................................................ 10 3. Preparing for the garden city of the future. .............................................................. 14 3.1. The need for new solutions. .............................................................................. 14 3.2. Garden City principles revisited......................................................................... 14 3.3. Selecting the right location for a new garden city. ............................................. 15 3.4. Understanding the drivers and the markets ...................................................... 16 3.5. Creating places -
147 Chapter 5 South Africa's Experience with Inflation: A
147 CHAPTER 5 SOUTH AFRICA’S EXPERIENCE WITH INFLATION: A CENTRAL BANK PERSPECTIVE 5.1 Introduction Although a country’s experience with inflation can be reviewed from different perspectives (e.g. the government, the statistical agency responsible for recording inflation, producers, consumers or savers), this chapter reviews South Africa’s experience with inflation from the perspective of the SA Reserve Bank. The SA Reserve Bank was chosen because this study focuses on inflation from a monetary perspective. Reliable inflation data for South Africa are published as far back as 192153, co-inciding with the establishment of the SA Reserve Bank, although rudimentary data on price levels are available as far back as 1895. South Africa’s problems with accelerating inflation since the 1970s are well documented (see for instance De Kock, 1981; De Kock, 1984; Republiek van Suid-Afrika, 1985; Rupert, 1974a; Rupert, 1974b; or Stals, 1989), but various parts (or regions) of what constitutes today the Republic of South Africa have experienced problems with inflation, rising prices or currency depreciation well before 1921. The first example of early inflation in South Africa was caused by currency depreciation. At the time of the second British annexation of the Cape in 1806, the Dutch riksdaalder (“riksdollar”) served as the major local currency in circulation. During the tenure of Caledon, Governor of the Cape Colony from 1807 to 1811, and Cradock, Governor from 1811 to 1814, riksdollar notes in circulation were increased by nearly 50 per cent (Engelbrecht, 1987: 29). As could be expected under circumstances of increasing currency in circulation, the value of the riksdollar in comparison to the British pound sterling and in terms of its purchasing power declined from 4 shillings in 1806 to 1 shilling and 5½ pennies in 1825 (or 53 Tables A1 to C1 in Appendices A to C highlight South Africa’s experience with inflation, as measured by changes in the CPI since 1921. -
USA Metric System History Pat Naughtin 2009 Without the Influence of Great Leaders from the USA There Would Be No Metric System
USA metric system history Pat Naughtin 2009 Without the influence of great leaders from the USA there would be no metric system. Since many in the USA do not believe this statement, let me repeat it in a different way. It is my belief that without the influence of Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, and George Washington, the metric system would not have developed in France in the 1780s and 1790s. The contribution made by these three great world leaders arose firstly from their cooperation in developing and implementing the idea of a decimal currency for the USA. The idea was that all money could be subdivided by decimal fractions so that money calculations would then be little more difficult than any normal whole number calculation. In 1782, Thomas Jefferson argued for a decimal currency system with 100 cents in a dollar. Less well known, he also argued for 1000 mils in a dollar. Jefferson reasoned that dividing America's First Silver Dollar decimally was the simplest way of doing this, and that a decimal system based on America's First Silver Dollar should be adopted as standard for the USA. The idea of using decimal fractions with decimal numbers was not new – even in the 1780s. Thomas Jefferson had studied 'Disme: the art of tenths' by Simon Stevin in which the use of decimals for all activities was actively promoted. Stevin proposed decimal fractions and their decimal arithmetic for: ... stargazers, surveyors, carpet-makers, wine-gaugers, mint-masters and all kind of merchants. Clearly Simon Stevin had in mind the use of decimal methods for all human activities and it is likely that this thought inspired Thomas Jefferson to propose not only a decimal currency for the USA but also a whole decimal method for weights and measures. -
Currency Wars, Recession Policies and the Overvalued Euro Are to Be Blamed for the Modern Greek Tragedy
International Journal in Economics and Business Administration Volume IV, Issue 1, 2016 pp. 3 - 19 Currency Wars, Recession Policies and the Overvalued Euro are to be Blamed for the Modern Greek Tragedy Theodore Katsanevas* Abstract: In this paper we argue that, Modern Greek Tragedy is mainly due to the overvalued euro in combination with the strict austerity policies imposed by Berlin. Greece also pays the price of the currency war between the dollar and the euro. The latter puts a heavy burden upon the country’s economic competitiveness as a costume that does not fit the Greek economy, which is mainly based on tourism that requires a labour-intensive production process. The deadlocks of strict monetary and income’s policies, accelerates the upcoming economic thunderstorm, the spiral of recession, the increase in unemployment, the brutal reduction of wages and pensions, the further fall of GDP and the increase of the debt. The always renewed fatal economic forecasts, simply postpone the explosion of the deadlock. Basic economics in theory and in practice are being depreciated. One wonders if there are economists, neoliberals, not to mention, Keynesians and/or radicals that, may support the possibility of an economic recovery under deep recession policies and the existence of a hard currency such as the euro. Trapped under the Berlin’s political prison and the euro zone fetish, Greece continues to follow its tragic road on the grounds that there is no alternative. Yet, in democracies there are no dead ends. If an economic policy is proven to be wrong and catastrophic, the best alternative is to change it. -
Capital-Economics-Border-Adjustment
Capital Economics is a leading independent international macro-economic research consultancy, providing research on Europe, the Middle East, United States, Canada, Africa, Asia and Australasia, Latin America and the United Kingdom, as well as analysis of financial markets, commodities and the consumer and property sectors. Founded in 1999 by reputed City of London economist Roger Bootle, we have gained an enviable reputation for original and insightful research and have built up a wide and distinguished client base. We undertake bespoke research projects commissioned by companies, government agencies and trade associations. We have helped our clients to produce substantial and detailed research, present to investors and shareholders and lobby government bodies. Our independent reports are used to plan for the future, influence internal business decisions and shape public opinion. In addition, we produce publications for world-wide distribution and offer support to clients in their respective time-zones through our offices in London, New York, Toronto, Singapore and Sydney. Over 1,500 institutions across the globe, ranging from some of the world’s largest banks to boutique property investors, subscribe to our publication packages, or are clients of our consultancy service. They include government bodies, trade associations, political parties, multinational mining and extractive industry companies, global banks, hedge funds, stockbrokers, retailers, property developers, construction companies, building societies and specialist lenders. We are our clients’ outsourced economic advisers. In addition to regular media accolades for economic forecasting, in 2012 a team from Capital Economics, led by Roger Bootle, won the £250,000 Wolfson Economics Prize. Acknowledgements: We wish to acknowledge and thank those individuals and their associated companies, organisations and academic institutions that gave their time to help provide information used in this report and without which it would not have been possible. -
Eurozone Groupthink and Denial on a Grand Scale
World Economic Review Eurozone Groupthink and Denial on a Grand Scale William Mitchell1 University of Newcastle, Australia 1. Introduction Thrall … slavery, bondage … a state of servitude or submission (Merriam Webster online dictionary). Groupthink … a pattern of thought characterized by self deception, forced manufacture of consent, and conformity to group values and ethic (Merriam Webster online dictionary). This paper is drawn from Mitchell (2015), which traced the origins of the Eurozone back to the desire in the immediate post-World War II period to end the destructive Franco-German rivalry that had caused several major military conflicts, which culminated in German aggression in 1939. Against this background, Mitchell (2015) also examines the way in which the discussions of European economic integration, which had initially begun with the general context of a Keynesian approach to economic policymaking, were transformed by the emergence of Monetarism in the 1970s. The flawed design of the Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) that was finally agreed on and formulated in the Maastricht Treaty in 1991 reflected both these elements. The dysfunctional response to the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) is a direct result of the mistakes made in the lead up to Maastricht and reflect the dominance of what we might call neo-liberal Groupthink over sound macroeconomic management. The paper is laid out as follows: section 2 considers the path that the European Member States took on the way to establishing the EMU. It also documents examines the impact of the GFC and the policy response taken by the key institutions (European Commission (EC), the European Central Bank (ECB) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), which are collectively known as the ‘Troika’, given their role in the disastrous Greek bailout. -
Worldwide Fiscal Crisis: Fact Or Fiction?
Issue 7, July 2016 Worldwide Fiscal Crisis: Fact or Fiction? Worldwide Fiscal Crisis: Fact or Fiction? Introduction 1 John T. Harvey Taxes are for Redemption, Not Spending 3 L. Randall Wray The Debt Ratio and Sustainable Macroeconomic Policy 12 Scott T. Fullwiler Eurozone Groupthink and Denial on a Grand Scale 43 William Mitchell Austerity in Mexico: Economic Impacts and Unpleasant Choices Ahead 56 Juan Carlos Moreno-Brid, Noel Pérez-Benítez and Héctor J. Villarreal World Economic Review ISSN: 2049-3517 Published by the World Economics Association Sister WEA open-access journals: Economic Thought and Real-World Economics Review World Economic Review Worldwide Fiscal Crisis: Fact or Fiction? John T. Harvey Texas Christian University and the Binzagr Institute for Sustainable Prosperity Pundits and policymakers throughout the world are calling for drastic reductions in government budget deficits. Their fear is that the weight of accumulating debt will lead to disaster as it drives up interest rates, causes inflation, and forces defaults. What may appear to be reasonable policy today, they caution, will bring catastrophe in the not-too-distant future. The groundswell of fear is so great that it has generated grass-roots campaigns and political movements calling for budget balancing. These are not the only voices, however. Just as vehement are those arguing that the real danger lies not in increasing, but reducing deficits and debt levels. They say that government spending is, by definition, private sector earning and that warnings regarding national bankruptcies are based on a flawed understanding of modern fiscal budgeting and financial markets. They point to the unemployment and stagnation created by austerity programs as evidence of what reducing spending and raising taxes really accomplishes. -
1 from the Franc to the 'Europe': Great Britain, Germany and the Attempted Transformation of the Latin Monetary Union Into A
From the Franc to the ‘Europe’: Great Britain, Germany and the attempted transformation of the Latin Monetary Union into a European Monetary Union (1865-73)* Luca Einaudi I In 1865 France, Italy, Belgium and Switzerland formed a monetary union based on the franc and motivated by geographic proximity and intense commercial relations.1 The union was called a Latin Monetary Union (LMU) by the British press to stress the impossibility of its extension to northern Europe.2 But according to the French government and many economists of the time, it had a vocation to develop into a European or Universal union. This article discusses the relations between France, which proposed to extend the LMU into a European monetary union in the 1860’s, and the main recipients of the proposal; Great Britain and the German States. It has usually been assumed that the British and the Germans did not show any interest in participating in such a monetary union discussed at an international monetary Conference in Paris in 1867 and that any attempt was doomed from the beginning. For Vanthoor ‘France had failed in its attempt to use the LMU as a lever towards a global monetary system during the international monetary conference... in 1867,’ while for Kindleberger ‘the recommendations of the conference of 1867 were almost universally pigeonholed.’3 With the support of new diplomatic and banking archives, together with a large body of scientific and journalistic literature of the time, I will argue that in fact the French proposals progressed much further and were close to success by the end of 1869, but failed before and independently from the Franco-Prussian war of 1870. -
UK FINANCIAL HISTORY 1950 – 2015 Version FEBRUARY 2016 Operator Info
Document Info Notes Form SW55063 Job ID 57630 Size A4 Pages 1 Colour CMYK UK FINANCIAL HISTORY 1950 – 2015 Version FEBRUARY 2016 Operator Info 1 ALI 29/02/16 2 ALI 07/03/16 Barclays Equity Index £156,840 3 Dividends Reinvested 4 5 £100,000 6 Big Bang in the city London Olympics Interest rates hit 15% • 7 Northern Rock crisis • • 8 ECONOMIC INDICATORS Berlin Wall comes down Japanese• earthquake • • 9 30 Unemployment tops 3 million Bangladesh factory disaster RPI – annual % change (quarterly) • • 10 Stockmarket hits 62 England, Wales, Northern Ireland introduce smoking ban • Lockerbie disaster • 11 25 Bank base rates (quarterly avg.) • Scotland introduces smoking ban Bin Laden killed • • 12 First test tube baby born 20 GDP – annual % change (quarterly) • • ‘Black Wednesday’ stockmarket crisis Banking debt crisis hits UK Nelson Mandela dies 13 • • 14 15 London wins Olympic bid Greek bail-outs • UK gets £2,300 million from IMF • Single European Market begins • • 15 UK Interest Rates set at 0.5% Ebola outbreak Barclays Equity Price Index 10 • £9,558 £10,000 • Ex-Dividends Proof number 1 2 3 4 Barclays Gilt Index 5 Japanese interest rates at record low of 0.5% £8,631 • Ceasefire in Vietnam • Income Reinvested Mandatory checks 0 Poll Tax riots Hong Kong handover Plaza accord • Cyprus bail-out £5,554 UK Building Society Index • • • Income Reinvested -5 UK joins EEC News of World closes New Brand - use approved template (check size) • • War in Iraq Cuba/US• reconciliation Falklands War • • £3,058 Retail Prices Index Footer/Form number/version -
The Bank of England and Earlier Proposals for a Decimal ,Coinage
The Bank of England and earlier proposals for a decimal ,coinage The introduction of a decimal system of currency in Febru ary 1971 makes it timely to recall earlier proposals for decimalisation with which the Bank were concerned. The establishment of a decimal coinage has long had its advocates in this country.As early as 1682 Sir William Petty was arguing in favour of a system which would make it possible to "keep all Accompts in a way of Decimal Arith metick".1 But the possibility of making the change did not become a matter of practical politics until a decade later, when the depreciated state of the silver currency made it necessary to undertake a wholesale renewal of the coinage. The advocates of decimalisation, including Sir Christopher Wren - a man who had to keep many 'accompts' - saw in the forthcoming renewal an opportunity for putting the coin age on a decimal basis.2 But the opportunity was not taken. In 1696 - two years after the foundation of the Bank - the expensive and difficult process of recoinage was carried through, but the new milled coins were issued in the tra ditional denominations. Although France and the United States, for different reasons, adopted the decimal system in the 18th century, Britain did not see fit to follow their example. The report of a Royal Commission issued in 1819 considered that the existing scale for weights and measures was "far more con venient for practical purpose,s than the Decimal scale".3 The climate of public opinion was, however, changing and in 1849 the florin was introduced in response to Parliamentary pressure as an experimental first step towards a decimal ised coinage. -
Garden Cities, Towns and Villages 6
BRIEFING PAPER Number 06867, 10 July 2017 Garden cities, towns and By Louise Smith villages Alison Pratt Contents: 1. Summary 2. The Garden City Concept 3. The current housing context 4. Principles and delivery of garden cities 5. Government support for garden cities, towns and villages 6. Case studies of garden cities, towns and villages 7. Controversies, problems and dissent www.parliament.uk/commons-library | intranet.parliament.uk/commons-library | [email protected] | @commonslibrary 2 Garden cities, towns and villages Contents 1. Summary 3 2. The Garden City Concept 4 2.1 The New Towns Programme 4 2.2 Problems with New Towns 5 3. The current housing context 6 4. Principles and delivery of garden cities 7 4.1 Town and Country Planning Association 8 4.2 Lyons Commission Report 8 4.3 New Garden Cities Alliance 9 5. Government support for garden cities, towns and villages 10 5.1 2015-17 Government 10 January 2017 decision on locations 11 Housing White Paper proposals 11 Neighbourhood Planning Act 2017 12 5.2 2010-15 Coalition Government 12 6. Case studies of garden cities, towns and villages 14 6.1 Ebbsfleet 14 6.2 Spitalgate Heath Garden Village 16 6.3 Halsnead Garden Village in Merseyside 16 6.4 Welborne Garden Village in Hampshire. 16 6.5 St Cuthberts Garden Village (Carlisle South) 17 6.6 Bicester Garden Town 17 7. Controversies, problems and dissent 18 Cover page image copyright: leaves-167478_1920 by Hans. Licensed by Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal (CC0 1.0) / image cropped. 3 Commons Library Briefing, 10 July 2017 1.