tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8764541874043694159.post9084738882669737689..comments2024-03-28T12:23:39.665+00:00Comments on Coppola Comment: This made me angryFrances Coppolahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09399390283774592713noreply@blogger.comBlogger7125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8764541874043694159.post-69549384664386535312012-04-29T10:46:08.620+01:002012-04-29T10:46:08.620+01:00Frances
Agreed - and I had realised Hines was tal...Frances<br /><br />Agreed - and I had realised Hines was talking about the rich nations although it was none too clear. I also posted my comments on Vickers at <a href="http://www.themoneyprinciple.co.uk/2011/new-uk-banking-regulation" rel="nofollow">TMP</a> which I think will prove to prolong the recession we have now re-entered for a long time. (I will ask Maria to update the post on transnational corporations because the paper has been published now I think).<br /><br />An international regulator would be a good idea but unlikely to be agreed by all (any of?) the current national regulators. Of course the banking industry would point to Basel but that is just one set of chums patting another set of chums on the back, a bit like HMG. Or they may become stand-ups and have us all falling off our chairs by pointing to the World Bank/IMF...!<br /><br />We can only deal with our own currency (at least we have one) so my answer would be to regulate all banks that hold accounts at the BoE. I would also regulate the people not the banks as I posted <a href="http://www.themoneyprinciple.co.uk/2012/regulate-the-people-not-the-banks/" rel="nofollow">recently</a>.<br /><br />We can't stop other banks holding pound notes (nor would we want to as that is an interest free loan to us) and don't want to cause an exodus of financial expertise which is actually an asset to the UK apart from a few bad men.John@MoneyPrinciplehttp://www.themoneyprinciple.co.uknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8764541874043694159.post-79311807343757237762012-04-29T10:01:29.824+01:002012-04-29T10:01:29.824+01:00John,
I made many of the same points as you in my...John,<br /><br />I made many of the same points as you in my answer to Andreas Paterson, above.<br /><br />I'm not convinced that dismantling the rich world's barriers to trade necessarily needs world government as such, though it would need much better cooperation among nations. <br /><br />But we certainly don't have free trade or anything close to it at the moment. My gripe with Hines is with his idea that the RICH world should increase its level of protectionism - he is clearly talking about developed nations imposing trade barriers and capital controls, since he then goes on to talk about supporting poorer nations to develop localised economies. <br /><br />I totally agree with Maria's comments on banking regulation. I opposed the Vickers ring-fence from the start because I do not think it will work and because it does not begin to address the real problems. My considered view for a long time now is that we need to move from regulating institutions to regulating and supervising the banking SYSTEM end-to-end. But that would require there to be a genuinely independent international regulator, which may be a pipe dream.Frances Coppolahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09399390283774592713noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8764541874043694159.post-8899363490609912392012-04-28T23:34:06.662+01:002012-04-28T23:34:06.662+01:00Frances
I was initially surprised that Hines publ...Frances<br /><br />I was initially surprised that Hines published his piece in the Telegraph as it is suggesting policy quite contrary to the present Coalition of the Incompetents aka Dave and the Toffettes. But perhaps it is covert support for UKIP ....<br /><br />I am not really sure what side I come down on in this argument, although I do see the illogicalities that you have pointed out. Free trade is a powerful redistributor of wealth. The problem is, as you point out, that it is free to the rich as long as it doesn't upset their electorates or vested interests. In which case it becomes very much not free. <br /><br />At the moment - and for the foreseeable future - it is China that is playing that game as it is distinctly not free both in trade and currency.<br /><br />The rich world also runs the IMF and World Bank. When they jump in to 'rescue' a (probably) poor and undeveloped economy, the first thing they insist on is to dismantle trade barriers. Is this any better than gunboats?<br /><br />If we in some way were to enact a genuine free trade where the market waved some equations and established proper exchanges for all goods, the poor would get richer and the rich too, as Brandt/Heath's North-South suggested so long ago. <br /><br />But to have that would need World Government - and guess who would end up running it! (You may care to look at Maria's post on <a href="http://www.themoneyprinciple.co.uk/2011/who-holds-the-strings-transnational-corporations-are-really-in-charge" rel="nofollow">transnational corporations</a>.)John@MoneyPrinciplehttp://www.themoneyprinciple.co.uknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8764541874043694159.post-27376049277417933702012-04-27T16:04:36.446+01:002012-04-27T16:04:36.446+01:00Only if you win. If you lose you end up destitute,...Only if you win. If you lose you end up destitute, enslaved or dead.Frances Coppolahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09399390283774592713noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8764541874043694159.post-91042777709150767002012-04-27T15:44:03.532+01:002012-04-27T15:44:03.532+01:00Andreas
You've made some huge assumptions the...Andreas<br /><br />You've made some huge assumptions there which can't really be deduced from what Hines has written. Where does he suggest that trade barriers would only apply to certain products and services and capital controls would be "flexible"? I've read his Comment is Free piece too. His ideas seem to be far more extreme than say quotas for certain products and services. <br /><br />In fact the rich world generally is already pretty protectionist: both the US and Europe have significant barriers to trade. I personally would like to see those dismantled, because I think it is absolutely disgraceful that for example the US limits imports of orange juice from poorer countries to protect its Florida orange growers. The World Bank and IMF have systematically skewed trade to benefit the US and Europe by insisting that poorer countries must open their markets to richer ones while failing to ensure that the richer ones do likewise. You think that even more protectionism is the answer to this?<br /><br />What do you think will happen to the thick northern lads in India if the UK puts up barriers to trade to benefit the thick northern lads in the UK? What right do we have to prefer "ours" over "theirs", especially as "theirs" are so much poorer than "ours"? <br /><br />Our trade deficit is someone else's surplus, and if that someone else is poorer countries that benefit from the fact that we import more from them than we export to them, then I for one am happy to run a trade deficit. I want to see living standards rise in poorer countries, and if that means that the UK gives up some of its wealth (which was at least partly accumulated through exploitation of those poorer countries, was it not?) then I am happy to accept that. I admit this is a personal view and many people will not agree with me on this. But the idea that the rich developed world should be even more protectionist than it already is I find simply revolting.Frances Coppolahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09399390283774592713noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8764541874043694159.post-46826862264844605462012-04-27T15:42:50.802+01:002012-04-27T15:42:50.802+01:00There is one way you can get more capital into an ...There is one way you can get more capital into an autarky - conquest. What a wonderful world it would be where you have to go to war to make your nation richer.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8764541874043694159.post-17146521989424649002012-04-27T14:40:48.288+01:002012-04-27T14:40:48.288+01:00Hi Frances, I'm afraid I'm having trouble ...Hi Frances, I'm afraid I'm having trouble working out how you make the step from having import controls, export controls and capital controls means a closed economy. Surely the import/export controls would imply tariffs on a limited selection of key goods. Capital controls also have a degree of flexibility on how they are applied.<br /><br />Another point here is that the best examples of countries lifting themselves out of poverty have done so using protectionist policies. Japan and South Korea being prime examples of this, both heavily protected their domestic markets in industries that their governments were hoping to develop only opening them up once those industries were ready to compete.<br /><br />At the heart of this kind of political thinking are two big problems, the first is that globalisation has certain distributional consequences that are undesirable. Freeing up trade may make eveyone on aggregate richer, but there are losers and in the UK it seems like the losers are unemployed young people living in old industrial areas (what Tim Worstall calls the "thick Northern lads problem"). The second problem is the trade imbalance problem, the UK has run a trade deficit for most of my life and this seems like a problem.<br /><br />Looking these two problems an industrial policy that makes use of a few protectionist policy tools presents what looks like a neat solution.Andreas Patersonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06431120459465519240noreply@blogger.com