Secular Stagnation or stagnation policy? Steindl after Summers

This multimedia dossier is part of the series „Understanding Finance“ by Finance Watch and explores the following questions: What is bank capital and how is it regulated? It further presents controversies on the size of bank capital in the aftermath of the financial crisis and on how bank capital affects economic activity.

The notion that the demand and supply side are independent is a key feature of textbook undergraduate economics and of modern macroeconomic models. Economic output is thought to be constrained by the productive capabilities of the economy - the ‘supply-side' - through technology, demographics and capital investment. In the short run a boost in demand may increase GDP and employment due to frictions such as sticky wages, but over the long-term successive rises in demand without corresponding improvements on the supply side can only create inflation as the economy reaches capacity. In this post I will explore the alternative idea of demand-led growth, where an increase in demand can translate into long-run supply side gains. This theory is most commonly associated with post-Keynesian economics, though it has been increasingly recognised in the mainstream literature.

Im AS-AD Gleichgewicht treffen die Gleichgewichtsbedingungen aller Märkte (Güter-, Geld-, Finanz- und Arbeitsmarkt) einer Volkswirtschaft zusammen. Das Gleichgewicht wird bestimmt durch die gesamtwirtschaftliche Nachfrage „aggregate demand“ und dem gesamtwirtschaftlichen Angebot „aggregate supply“ einer Volkswirtschaft.

The course will teach students to analyze the goals, implementation, and outcomes of economic policy.