Four Generations of Global Imbalanc
The introduction provides an overview of four generations of global imbalances among the USA, East Asia, the oil exporting countries, and within Europe. It presents an asymmetry matrix of global current accounts, and presents a survey over the papers in the special issue on Intra-European Imbalances, Global Imbalances, Interna- tional Banking, and International Financial Instability.
Japan continues to suffer from two lost decades of sluggish growth and ever-rising government debt. Europe and its common currency are drawn into lasting distress linked to the threatening default of a set of southern European crisis countries. The US Federal Reserve has announced several rounds of quantitative easing, which are not only expected to sustain employment, but also contribute to rising macroeco- nomic instability in the emerging world, including the new economic giant China. In many oil and raw material exporting countries hiking oil and raw material prices have triggered government spending driven consumption and speculation booms heralding future crises. All these crisis events were and are linked to structural current account deficits or surpluses and have in most cases triggered various forms of monetary expansion as crisis therapy.
Since in the early 1980s the current account imbalance between the USA and Japan emerged, four generations of global imbalances have come into existence. As in the case of the USA and Japan, hysteresis prevails. All four generations of global imbal- ances persist up to the present. Although in many cases current account imbalances were addressed by macroeconomic policy interventions to forestall future crises, none of these interventions—in particular exchange rate adjustment, monetary expansion, and hesitant structural reforms—has succeeded in bringing global current account imbalances down to sustainable levels.
The first generation of global imbalances emerged between Japan and the USA after Japan had liberalized international capital flows and the USA pursued a mon- etary tightening in the early 1980s. While net capital outflows from Japan pushed the Japanese current account into surplus, the US current account balance moved deeply into deficit. All attempts to realign the US–Japanese trade by rigorous yen apprecia- tion (Plaza Agreement of September 1985) or macroeconomic expansion in Japan (Louvre Accord of February 1987) failed (McKinnon and Ohno 1997). Instead, Japa- nese monetary expansion, which aimed to slow down post-Plaza yen appreciation pressure, contributed to the Japanese bubble economy. The bursting of the bubble set the stage not only for two decades of economic stagnation but also for the persistence of the Japanese current account surplus up to the present.
* Schnabl: Leipzig University, Department of Economics and Business Administration, Grimmaische Straße 12, 04109 Leipzig, Germany. Tel: +49 341 9733561; Fax: +49 341 9733569; E-mail: schnabl@wifa.uni- leipzig.de. Belke: University of Duisburg-Essen, Department of Economics and Business Administration, Universitätsstr. 12, 45117 Essen, Tel: +49 201 1832277; Fax: +49 201 1834181; E-mail: ansgar.belke@ wiwinf.uni-due.de.
© 2013 Blackwell Publishing Ltd
2 Ansgar Belke and Gunther Schnabl
Japan was joined by China and a group of smaller East Asian economies (Hong Kong, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand) to finance the US current account deficit (second generation of global imbalances). The Asian crisis transformed the East Asian current account deficit countries (Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, South Korea, Thailand) into structural current account surplus countries. Economic liberalization and an export-oriented growth strategy put the stage for China’s current account surplus after the turn of the millennium.
Between China and the USA an economic conflict about the Chinese dollar peg emerged, which is widely seen as the main driving force of the bilateral trade imbal- ance (Cheung et al., 2009). In contrast to Japan, China only allowed for controlled nominal appreciation of the Chinese yuan in response to external pressure. Similar to Japan, appreciation of the Chinese yuan vs the dollar could not reverse the current account surplus (as the real exchange rate remained widely stable). Instead one-way bets on yuan appreciation were invited, which accelerated the unprec- edented foreign reserve accumulation by the Peoples Bank of China (McKinnon and Schnabl 2012).
The third generation of global imbalances is driven by fast rising oil and raw mate- rial prices since the year 2003. In particular oil-exporting countries generated huge windfall profits from a rapid oil price increase. The resulting twin surpluses in net exports and government budgets were matched by a rising current account deficit of the USA and a set of southern European countries. In contrast, export-oriented economies in East Asia and northern Europe tended to profit from buoyant import demand from the oil producing rentier states (Belke and Gros 2010).
In contrast to the first and second generation of global imbalances no economic conflict arose concerning the tight dollar pegs of oil economies. Attempts to sterilize the monetary effects of fast rising windfall profits contributed to the growth of Sover- eign Wealth Funds, which could only partially prevent boom and crisis events as they occurred in Dubai or Russia. Sovereign Wealth Funds assumed a pivotal role in indus- trial policy strategies for instance in Saudi Arabia and Russia, thereby contributing to growing structural distortions in the oil producing world.
The fourth generation of global imbalances finally emerged in Europe. Starting from the turn of the millennium, diverging fiscal policy stances and diverging trends in unit labor costs led to diverging current account positions. Whereas Germany and some smaller northern European countries generated on the back of public and private austerity rising current account surpluses, many countries at the southern, eastern, and western periphery of Europe exhibited rising deficits. The different paths of unit labor costs, real exchange rates, current account balances, and net international debt and liability positions finally culminated—starting from 2007—in crises in Central and Eastern Europe, and in the euro area (Lane and Milesi-Ferretti 2011). As in most other cases of previous crisis events monetary expansion is seeking to contain contagion.
The history of four generations of global imbalances shows that despite various approaches to tackle the imbalances, in particular in form of nominal exchange rate adjustment and monetary expansion, they have continued to grow both with respect to the scope of current account imbalances and the number of countries being involved. Figure 1 shows the asymmetry matrix of global current accounts as put forward by Schnabl and Freitag (2012). It matches on the upper horizontal axis the US current account with the aggregated current account position of the two largest country groups pegging their exchanges rates to the dollar (East Asia and the net oil
1990
2012
1992 1994
1980 1982
1996 1998
1984 1986
2000 2002
1988 1990
1980 1982
2004 2006
1992 1994
1984 1986
2008 2010
1996 1998
1988 1990
2012
2000 2002
1992 1994
1980 1983
2004 2006
1996 1998
2000 2002
1986 1989
2012
1992 1995
1998 2001
2004 2007
2010
2008 2010
Billion USD Billion USD
Billion USD Billion USD
4 Ansgar Belke and Gunther Schnabl
imbalances and global imbalances. It aimed to trace the role of the financial sector for the transmission of current account imbalances and the consequences for interna- tional financial instability.
The special issue on this topic includes a paper by Ansgar Belke and Christian Dreger who identify the role of the economic catch-up process vs competitiveness for intra-European imbalances via panel-econometric techniques. Based on a dynamic general equilibrium model, Finn Marten Körner and Holger Zemanek analyse the sustainability of foreign debt in Europe, and identify the role of structural reforms to address intra-European imbalances. Virgine Coudert, Cécile Couharde, and Valerie Mignon start from a behavioral equilibrium exchange rate (BEER) approach, and identify real exchange rate misalignments being at the root of current account imbal- ances and crisis in Europe.
Ronald McKinnon and Zhao Liu investigate whether zero interest rates in the USA provoke world monetary instability, and constrict the US economy in regaining growth momentum. Hiro Ito and Ulrich Volz examine the impact of reforms in the financial sector, social protection, and healthcare on current account imbalances of China. The roles of saving, investment, and the renminbi in rebalancing the Chinese economy are discussed by Guonan Ma, Robert McCauley, and Lillie Lam. Jean- Baptiste Gossé and Cyriac Guillaumin analyze, based on a structural vector- autoregressive model, whether external shocks are able to explain the Asian side of global imbalances.
Lukas Vogel uses the European Commission’s QUEST III model to compare the impact of product market reform, labor market reform, and fiscal tightening on eco- nomic activity and external accounts in infinite-horizon and finite-horizon versions of the model. Subsequently, Bernhard Herz, and Stefan Hohberger embark on a DSGE model based analysis of the relation between fiscal policy, monetary regimes and current account dynamics. Short-term and long-term growth effects of exchange rate adjustment in the face of asymmetric shocks are singled out by Evžen Kocˇ enda, Math- ilde Maurel, and Gunther Schnabl in a panel cointegration framework for a sample of 60 countries. Finally, Ulrich Bindseil and Adalbert Winkler analyze dual liquidity crises, i.e. funding crises which encompass the private and the public sector, and the shock absorbing capacity of central banks within a closed system of financial accounts.
The Berlin confer
Four Generations of Global Imbalanc
The introduction provides an overview of four generations of global imbalances among the USA, East Asia, the oil exporting countries, and within Europe. It presents an asymmetry matrix of global current accounts, and presents a survey over the papers in the special issue on Intra-European Imbalances, Global Imbalances, Interna- tional Banking, and International Financial Instability.
Japan continues to suffer from two lost decades of sluggish growth and ever-rising government debt. Europe and its common currency are drawn into lasting distress linked to the threatening default of a set of southern European crisis countries. The US Federal Reserve has announced several rounds of quantitative easing, which are not only expected to sustain employment, but also contribute to rising macroeco- nomic instability in the emerging world, including the new economic giant China. In many oil and raw material exporting countries hiking oil and raw material prices have triggered government spending driven consumption and speculation booms heralding future crises. All these crisis events were and are linked to structural current account deficits or surpluses and have in most cases triggered various forms of monetary expansion as crisis therapy.
Since in the early 1980s the current account imbalance between the USA and Japan emerged, four generations of global imbalances have come into existence. As in the case of the USA and Japan, hysteresis prevails. All four generations of global imbal- ances persist up to the present. Although in many cases current account imbalances were addressed by macroeconomic policy interventions to forestall future crises, none of these interventions—in particular exchange rate adjustment, monetary expansion, and hesitant structural reforms—has succeeded in bringing global current account imbalances down to sustainable levels.
The first generation of global imbalances emerged between Japan and the USA after Japan had liberalized international capital flows and the USA pursued a mon- etary tightening in the early 1980s. While net capital outflows from Japan pushed the Japanese current account into surplus, the US current account balance moved deeply into deficit. All attempts to realign the US–Japanese trade by rigorous yen apprecia- tion (Plaza Agreement of September 1985) or macroeconomic expansion in Japan (Louvre Accord of February 1987) failed (McKinnon and Ohno 1997). Instead, Japa- nese monetary expansion, which aimed to slow down post-Plaza yen appreciation pressure, contributed to the Japanese bubble economy. The bursting of the bubble set the stage not only for two decades of economic stagnation but also for the persistence of the Japanese current account surplus up to the present.
* Schnabl: Leipzig University, Department of Economics and Business Administration, Grimmaische Straße 12, 04109 Leipzig, Germany. Tel: +49 341 9733561; Fax: +49 341 9733569; E-mail: schnabl@wifa.uni- leipzig.de. Belke: University of Duisburg-Essen, Department of Economics and Business Administration, Universitätsstr. 12, 45117 Essen, Tel: +49 201 1832277; Fax: +49 201 1834181; E-mail: ansgar.belke@ wiwinf.uni-due.de.
© 2013 Blackwell Publishing Ltd
2 Ansgar Belke and Gunther Schnabl
Japan was joined by China and a group of smaller East Asian economies (Hong Kong, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand) to finance the US current account deficit (second generation of global imbalances). The Asian crisis transformed the East Asian current account deficit countries (Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, South Korea, Thailand) into structural current account surplus countries. Economic liberalization and an export-oriented growth strategy put the stage for China’s current account surplus after the turn of the millennium.
Between China and the USA an economic conflict about the Chinese dollar peg emerged, which is widely seen as the main driving force of the bilateral trade imbal- ance (Cheung et al., 2009). In contrast to Japan, China only allowed for controlled nominal appreciation of the Chinese yuan in response to external pressure. Similar to Japan, appreciation of the Chinese yuan vs the dollar could not reverse the current account surplus (as the real exchange rate remained widely stable). Instead one-way bets on yuan appreciation were invited, which accelerated the unprec- edented foreign reserve accumulation by the Peoples Bank of China (McKinnon and Schnabl 2012).
The third generation of global imbalances is driven by fast rising oil and raw mate- rial prices since the year 2003. In particular oil-exporting countries generated huge windfall profits from a rapid oil price increase. The resulting twin surpluses in net exports and government budgets were matched by a rising current account deficit of the USA and a set of southern European countries. In contrast, export-oriented economies in East Asia and northern Europe tended to profit from buoyant import demand from the oil producing rentier states (Belke and Gros 2010).
In contrast to the first and second generation of global imbalances no economic conflict arose concerning the tight dollar pegs of oil economies. Attempts to sterilize the monetary effects of fast rising windfall profits contributed to the growth of Sover- eign Wealth Funds, which could only partially prevent boom and crisis events as they occurred in Dubai or Russia. Sovereign Wealth Funds assumed a pivotal role in indus- trial policy strategies for instance in Saudi Arabia and Russia, thereby contributing to growing structural distortions in the oil producing world.
The fourth generation of global imbalances finally emerged in Europe. Starting from the turn of the millennium, diverging fiscal policy stances and diverging trends in unit labor costs led to diverging current account positions. Whereas Germany and some smaller northern European countries generated on the back of public and private austerity rising current account surpluses, many countries at the southern, eastern, and western periphery of Europe exhibited rising deficits. The different paths of unit labor costs, real exchange rates, current account balances, and net international debt and liability positions finally culminated—starting from 2007—in crises in Central and Eastern Europe, and in the euro area (Lane and Milesi-Ferretti 2011). As in most other cases of previous crisis events monetary expansion is seeking to contain contagion.
The history of four generations of global imbalances shows that despite various approaches to tackle the imbalances, in particular in form of nominal exchange rate adjustment and monetary expansion, they have continued to grow both with respect to the scope of current account imbalances and the number of countries being involved. Figure 1 shows the asymmetry matrix of global current accounts as put forward by Schnabl and Freitag (2012). It matches on the upper horizontal axis the US current account with the aggregated current account position of the two largest country groups pegging their exchanges rates to the dollar (East Asia and the net oil
1990
2012
1992 1994
1980 1982
1996 1998
1984 1986
2000 2002
1988 1990
1980 1982
2004 2006
1992 1994
1984 1986
2008 2010
1996 1998
1988 1990
2012
2000 2002
1992 1994
1980 1983
2004 2006
1996 1998
2000 2002
1986 1989
2012
1992 1995
1998 2001
2004 2007
2010
2008 2010
Billion USD Billion USD
Billion USD Billion USD
4 Ansgar Belke and Gunther Schnabl
imbalances and global imbalances. It aimed to trace the role of the financial sector for the transmission of current account imbalances and the consequences for interna- tional financial instability.
The special issue on this topic includes a paper by Ansgar Belke and Christian Dreger who identify the role of the economic catch-up process vs competitiveness for intra-European imbalances via panel-econometric techniques. Based on a dynamic general equilibrium model, Finn Marten Körner and Holger Zemanek analyse the sustainability of foreign debt in Europe, and identify the role of structural reforms to address intra-European imbalances. Virgine Coudert, Cécile Couharde, and Valerie Mignon start from a behavioral equilibrium exchange rate (BEER) approach, and identify real exchange rate misalignments being at the root of current account imbal- ances and crisis in Europe.
Ronald McKinnon and Zhao Liu investigate whether zero interest rates in the USA provoke world monetary instability, and constrict the US economy in regaining growth momentum. Hiro Ito and Ulrich Volz examine the impact of reforms in the financial sector, social protection, and healthcare on current account imbalances of China. The roles of saving, investment, and the renminbi in rebalancing the Chinese economy are discussed by Guonan Ma, Robert McCauley, and Lillie Lam. Jean- Baptiste Gossé and Cyriac Guillaumin analyze, based on a structural vector- autoregressive model, whether external shocks are able to explain the Asian side of global imbalances.
Lukas Vogel uses the European Commission’s QUEST III model to compare the impact of product market reform, labor market reform, and fiscal tightening on eco- nomic activity and external accounts in infinite-horizon and finite-horizon versions of the model. Subsequently, Bernhard Herz, and Stefan Hohberger embark on a DSGE model based analysis of the relation between fiscal policy, monetary regimes and current account dynamics. Short-term and long-term growth effects of exchange rate adjustment in the face of asymmetric shocks are singled out by Evžen Kocˇ enda, Math- ilde Maurel, and Gunther Schnabl in a panel cointegration framework for a sample of 60 countries. Finally, Ulrich Bindseil and Adalbert Winkler analyze dual liquidity crises, i.e. funding crises which encompass the private and the public sector, and the shock absorbing capacity of central banks within a closed system of financial accounts.
The Berlin confer
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