samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
Generally, systems are working better and the economy is getting bigger and bigger and more and more sophisticated; doing exemptions on a project basis, except in very rare cases, will soon hold us back. The new government should take that last hurdle and make the general system acceptable, even if minimally by lowering taxes and making improvement in civil service performance, probably by making the civil service remunerated by output and productivity rather than the tenure system as at present. That leads to my comment on the long term initiatives that the government might carry out that would help in the long run, which I think is the main strategy for real recovery to take place. Without good long run prospects, there isn’t much hope to do well in the present. The government will have to be moved more on to the private sector footing. This doesn’t mean just selling state enterprises and such things. But it does mean that the government units that are retained would have to work for incentives in terms of output and cost reduction and have to, in general, compete with the private sector for government budget. BIS Review 108/2000  4  Generally, the private sector is not necessarily more efficient than the government. The key is that those that are not don’t survive and better ones expand. This doesn’t happen in the government because those that are inefficient just ask for some more budget, and this is forcibly collected.

M R Chatu Mongol Sonakul: Some ideas for the new government in Thailand  Statement by Mr M R Chatu Mongol Sonakul, Governor of the Bank of Thailand, at the British Chamber of Commerce, Bangkok, on 23 November 2000. *  *  *  Chairman of the British Chamber of Commerce and all the chambers here today, distinguished guests, and ladies and gentlemen. Good afternoon. Let me begin by saying that it behoves me, and I have to use that word as a career civil servant who has taken his duty righteously for the last 35 years, not to comment on the work of the present government especially during an election period. In any case what they have done is fast becoming history and we have to take it as facts. A datum from which we will have to operate. In my career, I have been unenthusiastic in commenting about history, and only study it with a view to creating the future rather than commenting on it. If I wanted to comment on history, I guess I would have continued my dual career as a university lecturer which ended abruptly after the first year of my working life, since I found the responsibility of turning up regularly on time every week for anything quite unbearable as well as preferring to be on the implementation side rather than a commentator or analyst.
Importantly, the latest policy decisions remained fully in line with the ECB’s mandate and the principles I mentioned just now. Those who say that we were or still are “behind the curve” should consider all the decisions the ECB has taken since the financial crisis has intensified and broadened. In this respect, let us not forget that a central bank has only one instrument at hand, namely monetary policy. It cannot be held accountable for meeting more than one objective. Any such attempt would  2  BIS Review 139/2008  overburden monetary policy. For this reason, the Treaty provides for a clear and efficient allocation of policy responsibilities, with price stability being exclusively and primarily assigned to an independent ECB as its primary objective. Not surprisingly, our debates yesterday and today have triggered the question of how to safeguard EMU and build on its achievements at a time when the world’s financial landscape is changing dramatically. In fact, the current financial turmoil – the origins and implications of which we discussed in detail – is likely to dampen demand in the euro area and the rest of the world for quite some time. It may well turn out to be a litmus test for the functioning of EMU, both in economic and institutional terms. Having carefully listened to the presentations, I remain confident that monetary union will withstand the test of time. As illustrated during the conference, the euro has already brought real benefits to the 320 million people in the euro area.

Companies have been unable or unwilling to invest as a result of earlier investment mistakes and poorer prospects for the future. The banks have suffered severe credit losses, which has further intensified the recession, as their capacity to provide new credit has been limited. The situation becomes particularly serious when losses have led to acute bank crises, which has often been due to the banks being greatly exposed to a particular sector. For instance, it was an overheated property market with banks strongly exposed to this sector that was one of the main reasons behind the bank crises afflicting several countries – including Sweden – at the beginning of the 1990s. Adaptations to large financial imbalances have also put a burden on central government finances and increased uncertainty. This has in itself prolonged and intensified the crisis. Japan is a well-known example of what can follow in the tracks of a serious financial crisis if confidence cannot be recreated in economic policy and future growth potential. The consequences of financial imbalances have proved particularly serious in countries with a fixed exchange rate, partly because interest rates need to be kept high when confidence in the fixed exchange rate policy declines, and partly because there has often been a large foreign currency debt. When the fixed exchange rate has to be abandoned and the country's own currency is weakened, the burden of debt increases. Should the central bank then concern itself with asset prices?
Second, without violating the culture of observing the contractual obligations, it should be more active in the loan restructuring process to provide more room to businesses deserving it. Third, we think that Albania has in place business and development projects of a long-term interest that deserve greater attention. Lack of the loan demand is an already-known and well-understood problem. However, the banking system should be more flexible when assessing the submitted applications. In all my public pronouncements, I have iterated the prudence needed for sound public finances in the country. We deem that the country’s sustainable development economic paradigm requires taking swift measures for making the public finances healthier. Beyond the short-term challenges about the current year’s budget, putting in place a  2  BIS central bankers’ speeches  reliable and transparent fiscal rule is a necessity to discipline the fiscal policy in the long term and guarantee the trust of the financial markets in the Albanian public debt. Finally, the Bank of Albania deems that the macroeconomic stimulus should continue to be based on a stimulating monetary policy and a banking system more focused on the needs of the economy. Also, we believe that the fiscal policy lacks the room for such actions. This action path preserves the macroeconomic stimulus and the soundness of macroeconomic balances, hence providing the shape to the first pillar of development policies. 2. Second pillar: Reducing uncertainty in economy  The second pillar (of a short-term action, as well) relates to reducing uncertainty in the economy.

Svein Gjedrem: Perspectives on the role and effects of monetary policy Introduction by Mr Svein Gjedrem, Governor of Norges Bank (Central Bank of Norway), for the Holden Committee of Experts assessing the challenges facing the exposed sector, Oslo, 16 January 2003. *  *  *  Introduction The primary objective of monetary policy is to ensure nominal stability. There were wide fluctuations in the Norwegian economy in the 1970s and 1980s. Economic developments were marked by high and variable inflation. Inflation rose gradually and it took a long time before it fell. The absence of a nominal anchor was one of the main reasons behind these pronounced swings in the Norwegian economy. With a policy of low interest rates and devaluations, inflation took root. Nominal interest rates were kept at a low level even though inflation and the value of tax-deductible interest expenditure rose. Frequent devaluations from 1976 were not able to prevent a decline in the manufacturing sector. On the contrary, they proved to be self-reinforcing. The wide fluctuations culminated in a credit boom in the mid-1980s, followed by a deep recession and high unemployment towards the end of the 1980s. From the mid-1980s, during and after the credit bubble, it was recognised that a substantial revision in economic policy would be necessary and that the problems created by inflation had to be taken seriously. The exchange rate was chosen as the nominal anchor. A deterioration in competitiveness due to high wage growth would no longer be rectified by means of devaluations.
When the course of medium-term inflation expectations is analyzed, it is observed that the expected inflation continues to remain well below the actual inflation figures although inflation had clearly remained above the target level for quite some time. When considering the period of high inflation levels experienced by Turkey in recent years, one of the most significant achievements of the inflation-targeting regime has been its success in managing expectations in a time of extraordinary shocks. Operational framework for monetary policy Inflation targets Inflation targets have been set jointly with the Government as “point target” since 2006, over the end-year inflation rates calculated by the annual percentage change of the Consumer Price Index (CPI) for a target horizon of three years. As mentioned above, targets for the next three-year period were announced during the revision in June 2008. Within this framework, inflation targets for 2009, 2010 and 2011 are 7.5 percent, 6.5 percent and 5.5 percent, respectively. Accountability In the first three-year period of the inflation-targeting regime, the Central Bank explained the reasons for deviations from inflation targets and policy measures taken with open letters sent to the Government, and hence meticulously applied the principle of accountability. Gradually, Inflation Reports also became a significant support to the accountability mechanism.

And third, how to compensate for the democratic deficit of technocratic monetary policy decision-making. Concerning the first issue, empirical research has found out that greater central bank independence is on average associated with lower inflation, but not with higher volatility. This “free lunch” was a bit surprising in the light of the “conservative central banker theory”. It reflects the fact that the actual institutional and policy design has evolved over time to guarantee that the mandate to achieve low inflation is not interpreted rigidly. In fact, most central bankers pay attention to real economic developments in their policies. In the last decade, this fact has been formally and institutionally reflected in the “flexible” inflation-targeting regime. This regime is often described as “constrained discretion”, meaning that it aims at making the monetary policy-making constrained by understandable procedures and at the same time flexible in responding to unforeseen shocks. As far as the democratic deficit is concerned, this issue has been addressed by moving to greater transparency and accountability of central banks. The burden of proof in central banks’ communication has shifted over the last two decades. At present, it is necessary to give convincing arguments if one thinks that the central bank should not give out some information, rather than to argue why something should be revealed. This has been a significant shift in the central banks’ mentality. Regarding the issue of communication and co-operation between the central bank and government, no universal solution has been found so far.
This time, nurses and teachers were the first onto the field with regard to wage bargaining and they signed 5-year agreements, which roused some concern that high wage agreements stemming from the favourable demand situation would spread to the rest of the labour market. The average level of the wage agreements in the economy was around 3 per cent, which is slightly higher than the previous bargaining round in 1998, when the agreements came out at around 2.6 per cent. However, it shows that the social partners have moved closer to a non-inflationary wage agreement, despite the fact that economic activity was high when the bargaining rounds began in autumn 2000. Why has the rate of wage increase been subdued over the past decade? Studies made by the Riksbank show that the slowing down in the rate of wage increase during the 1990s was primarily due to the fact that the formulation and organisation of monetary policy had led to lower inflation expectations (since 1996 inflation expectations among the social partners have  1  See, for instance, Nils Elvander, "Industriavtalet och Saltsjöbadsavtalet - en jämförelse" (The industrial agreement and the Saltsjöbaden agreement - a comparison), Arbetsmarknad & Arbetsliv No. 3, 2002, pp. 191-204. 2  Gösta Edgren, Karl-Olof Faxen & Clas-Erik Odhner, Wage Formation and the Economy, Allen and Unwin, 1973. 3  The National Mediation Office, "Avtalsrörelsen och lönebildningen 2001" (Bargaining rounds and wage formation 2002), annual report from the National Mediation Office, 2002.

Future challenges for wage formation The Municipal Workers' Union's termination of its collective wage agreement for 450 000 members before the third year and the demand for relative wage changes entail touchstone for wage formation. The union has for a long period watched its wages situation deteriorate in relation to industrial workers and other groups in the public sector. During the previous bargaining rounds, however, the LO unions were agreed that the Municipal Workers' Union should receive higher wage increases than the other member unions in order to improve its relative wages. However, the union is dissatisfied with the outcome so far, which it claims has given only 0.4 percentage points above the wage increases achieved through collective bargaining. This union's members are currently among those with the lowest wages in the labour market, with an average wage of approximately SEK 16 000. The Municipal Workers' Union's wage demands are not in themselves a threat to the inflation target, as long as other groups in the labour market are prepared to stand back in favour of this union's members. However, there is a risk that other trade unions will follow their example and also demand higher wages. Approximately 70 per cent of the employees in trade and industry have the possibility of renegotiating their agreements during the final year of the agreement. Already, there have been demands for compensation if the Municipal Workers' Union members should be given higher wages.
Tharman Shanmugaratnam: Banking liberalisation’s next chapter digital banks Keynote address by Mr Tharman Shanmugaratnam, Chairman of the Monetary Authority of Singapore, at The Association of Banks in Singapore’s Annual Dinner, Singapore, 28 June 2019. * * * Chairman and Council Members of the ABS, Ladies and gentlemen, Thank you for inviting me to join you this evening. Our objectives in liberalising banking 2. I would like to talk this evening about our next steps in liberalising our banking system, and in taking advantage of the ongoing digital revolution in finance. 3. It will be a new phase in our banking system. But the spirit of what we intend to do, and the calibrated way in which we will move forward, is similar to the approach we have taken over the last twenty years, from the time we began liberalising the industry. 4. MAS embarked in 1999 on a major programme to open up and liberalise Singapore’s financial sector across the board, in banking, our securities markets and in insurance. 5. We did so to ensure we remained a competitive and growing centre for finance in Asia and globally. But enhanced competition was also a way to spur our local banks themselves to upgrade and innovate so that they remained strong anchors in our banking system, and to expand into markets abroad. 6. We took a calculated risk. The risk was not trivial, as we began opening up in the midst of the Asian financial crisis.

Ardian Fullani: China-Europe economy – future challenges and opportunities Address by Mr Ardian Fullani, Governor of the Bank of Albania, at the China-Europe Economists Symposium on “China-Europe economy – future challenges and opportunities”, Tirana, 17 January 2013. *  *  *  Dear Mr. Chairman, Dear Colleagues, Ladies and Gentlemen, It is a great pleasure for me to participate in this Symposium. The rapidly evolving economic landscape of the past few years poses to policy-makers a demanding set of challenges and opportunities. I am sure that the honest and productive exchange of ideas will facilitate a deeper understanding of the problems we are facing and will allow us to design more appropriate strategies for overcoming them. Introduction Our topics of discussion today focus on the performance and prospects of China and Europe, the two economic regions which probably are at the opposite ends of the spectrum of contagion from the global crisis. While China has remained largely unaffected, Europe has suffered significantly. The crisis exposed fundamental structural and institutional weaknesses in the Eurozone and the EU. In my short address, I will concentrate on the current state of Europe’s economic and financial situation. It would be almost an understatement to define the past, the current and the expected developments in the Europe, as difficult and short-term. The so-called “Great Depression” tested the Eurozone and the European economy. EU convergence process proved to be incomplete, from economic and institutional point of view.
But whether they are appropriate or not is a subsidiary question, and it is one that is related to the political economy of how to ensure the transparency of policy, the accountability of those responsible for it, and the way in which households and firms form expectations of policy: monetary, fiscal or other. Since the political economy varies from one country to another, so will the appropriate method of achieving price stability in particular, and economic policy stability in general. The crucial and overriding point is that a market economy cannot flourish if policymakers behave in ways that lead private agents to expect future economic policies – be those future monetary, fiscal, or legal policies – to be subject to arbitrary or capricious changes. Of course, an expectation of a stable regime will rarely translate into stable outcomes, and it would be irresponsible of policymakers to let such a misconception take hold. A well designed set of institutions will lead to responses being predictable, but cannot guarantee that outcomes will be. And there is a pressing issue here. In the US, inflation has been both low and rather stable. Over the past decade it has varied between 1.0% and 3.8%, so we can with some justification say that inflation no longer “materially enter[s] into the decisions of households and firms.” In the UK inflation has, if anything, been even more stable. But this success carries a risk for the future.

For example it would mean people have direct access to the ultimate risk-free asset. In its extreme form, it could fundamentally and perhaps abruptly re-shape banking. However, were it to co-exist with the current banking model, it could exacerbate liquidity risk by lowering the frictions involved in running to central bank money. 11 These questions and others are why these topics are being examined as part of the Bank’s research agenda, with the prospect of a central bank digital currency for the UK, in my view, still some way off. We will work to make payments easier, and though cash may no longer be king it once was, its reign will endure for some time. The fourth way the Bank is enabling the FinTech transformation is by partnering with FinTech companies on projects of direct relevance to the Bank’s mission. I am announcing tonight that the Bank is launching a FinTech Accelerator to work in partnership with FinTech firms on challenges that we, as a central bank, uniquely face. The Accelerator will work with new technology firms to help us harness FinTech innovations for central banking. In return, it will offer firms the chance to demonstrate their solutions for real issues facing us as policymakers, together with the valuable ‘first client’ reference that comes with it. With time, the Accelerator will build a network of firms working in this space for the benefit of us and them alike. How will this help us?
When banks turned to shareholders or the marketplace to raise new capital, they often were confronted with concerns about market perception, dilution of existing shareholders, potential loss of control by the current owners, and reduction of prices of existing equity and debt. These were and are valid issues, but again, judging from experience, they proved to be secondary to the central issue of ultimate recovery or resolution of the bank. BIS Review 86/1998  -7-  The enlightened self-interest of the management of a troubled bank usually allows it to see what needs to be done and to take appropriate action. If not, supervisors must have the means to step up the pressure through statutory enforcement powers. While the pressure initially can be informal and private, in the form of supervisory letters or similar instruments, it must be possible to move to more formal types of agreements with the board of directors of a troubled banking institution. Fifth, bank management and supervisors resolved troubled banking institutions. In the first instance, this meant understanding and helping bank boards of directors to understand what the options were for realizing value from the institution. Even for a bank losing substantial amounts of money, there may be aspects that represent valuable customer franchises or the opportunity to enter a new market or the ability to consolidate operations and increase operating leverage. These are assets for which there is a market—and a market price.

This is an effort that the Basle Committee plans to support not only through continued work on the Core Principles and the Compendium, but by providing expertise and supervisory resources to supplement and advise IMF and World Bank staff. The members of the Basle Committee in many cases have the staff with the deep expertise to help emerging markets supervisors with the application of the Principles in their national context and in light of various BIS Review 86/1998  -9-  obstacles. The IMF and World Bank have expressed their desire to bring more of that expertise to bear in their efforts, and we have begun discussions on how to accomplish that most effectively. In addition, we believe that first-hand observation of the practical issues in implementation will suggest what further elaboration and precision would be most useful to the Core Principles, and what additional research and papers, programs by the Institute for Financial Stability or specific technical assistance could supplement them. Our goal is to keep the Core Principles relevant, incisive and implemented by supervisors globally. In addition, we in the broader financial supervisory community must set thoughtful goals for ourselves as we manage our individual agendas. The problems that have beset many countries in Asia, Russia and other regions and countries are not confined to the banking sector, although that may be the largest part of the financial sector.