October 17, 2014
The NYT had an interesting piece about growing opposition to Germany’s creationist economics. The piece reports that France and Italy are leading the opposition to German’s insistence that austerity is the key to economic growth, in the face of massive amounts of evidence showing that the euro zone needs stimulus to boost growth.
At one point the piece points to worries over “the prospect of falling into a deflationary trap.” It is difficult to see what anyone would be worried about. The euro zone already has an inflation rate that is far too low. The latest data show inflation to be 0.4 percent over the last year, well below its 2.0 percent target, which is itself almost certainly too low to allow for effective monetary policy given the severity of the downturn.
Lower inflation will make matters worse, but nothing happens when the number turns negative. In other words, whatever concerns people have about a future of negative inflation they should already have now about a current inflation rate that is far too low.
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