samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
“School Choice and School Productivity (Or, Could School Choice be the Tide that Lifts all Boats? )”, The Economics of School Choice, University of Chicago Press, Chicago. Jackson, Kenneth T. Crabgrass Frontier: The Suburbanization of the United States. Oxford University Press, 1987. Piketty, Thomas and Emmanuel Saez. 2003. “Income Inequality in the United States, 1913–1998,” Quarterly Journal of Economics, 118 (1): 1–41. Schmutte, Ian M. 2015. “Job Referral Networks and the Determination of Earnings in Local Labor Markets,” Journal of Labor Economics, 33(1): 1–32. BIS central bankers’ speeches  7

Banks can satisfy some of their demand for liquidity by participating in these auctions. As the participating banks are then no longer as dependent on the secured interbank market for obtaining the desired amount of liquidity, aggregate demand for overnight liquidity in the repo market falls, thereby reducing upward pressures on SARON. We also wish to note that, over time, liquidity can be redistributed between banks via other channels than just the repo market. For instance, liquidity redistribution may take place via the transfer of customer deposits and longer-term deposits between banks. Naturally, such adjustment processes take some time. Let me summarise the key points we have made so far. The steering of short-term money market rates continues to work – even in negative territory. Three interest rates play a key role  Page 10/13  here. The SNB policy rate is used to communicate the monetary policy decision and, in particular, the desired stance of monetary policy. The negative interest rate on sight deposits that commercial banks hold at the SNB is the main instrument with which the SNB implements monetary policy on the money market. The exemption thresholds allow the burden on the banking system to be reduced without jeopardising the SNB’s ability to keep secured short-term money market rates, in particular SARON, close to its policy rate. As you can see, the SNB has the instruments needed to steer money market interest rates, including during times when these interest rates are in negative territory.
The most worrying missing component of the U.S. recovery has been the absence of job creation which has led many market participants and media representatives to make reference to a “jobless recovery”, or even a “jobloss recovery”. With the September employment report which was released last week, we now have at least some evidence that labor markets in the U.S. are improving somewhat. Provided these numbers get confirmed in the months to come, it would add weight to the hypothesis that early at cyclical turning points, official payroll numbers underestimate the actual number of jobs created. At such times, the household survey statistics might be a more accurate gauge of labour market conditions.12 At least for now, the latest employment data has strengthened market expectations of a sustained recovery. On the business spending side, we have also seen some encouraging signs of a pick up in spending on capital equipment though it would appear that, so far, much of this demand is for replacement purposes rather than expansion. However, business inventories in the United States have fallen to low levels. Rising inventories should therefore contribute to production increases in the months to come. Without confirmation that a pick up in inventory spending and an expansion of the labour force complete the traditional pattern of a recovery cycle, market concerns about the sustainability of the U.S. expansion are bound to persist. Moreover, financial markets will continue to follow carefully the growing twin deficit in the U.S. and the potential risk it represents to global exchange rate stability.

Philipp M Hildebrand: Monetary policy in a global context Speech by Mr Philipp M Hildebrand, Member of the Governing Board of the Swiss National Bank, at the Swiss-American Chamber of Commerce, Zurich, 8 October 2003. *  *  *  It is a special privilege to be able to give my first formal address as a central banker before the distinguished audience of the Swiss-American chamber of commerce. I have always been very fond of the Swiss-American friendship. It has been an integral part of my family’s life for several decades. More importantly, I am convinced it is an essential ingredient to the long-term vitality of the Swiss economy. Like any friendship, it has had to endure difficult moments. The vibrancy of your association is testimony to the fact that the cultural affinities and common interests between our two countries provide a reliable foundation for extensive and mutually beneficial economic relations. Let us strive to make this foundation as solid as the public service record of the Geneva-born Albert Gallatin, whom Thomas Jefferson appointed as the fourth Secretary of the U.S. Treasury in 1801. To this day, Gallatin remains not only the longest serving Treasury Secretary in the history of the United States but the only Swiss-American to have occupied that most prestigious position in the then newly established capital in Washington D.C. My focus today will be on the long period of global disinflation following Paul Volcker’s paradigmatic shift of monetary policy in the United States.
Figure 2: Bank of England QE programmes and selected policy interventions since 2009  Taken from the IEO’s report on its evaluation of QE. Figure 3: Bank of England balance sheet as a % of GDP  Source: Bank of England, available here. Dotted line extends series to end-2021, assuming completion of current asset purchase programme. All figures shown as a % of lagged GDP except 2021 figure which uses 2019 GDP to avoid distortions from the temporary Covid-related falls in 2020. 7  All speeches are available online at www.bankofengland.co.uk/news/speeches and @BoE_PressOffice  7  The headline numbers involved in those five interventions detailed in Figure 2 have been very large: in total once the current programme comes to an end the Bank will have purchased £ of government bonds and £ of corporate bonds – that is roughly 40% of annual (pre-Covid) UK GDP. Once that programme is complete the Bank’s balance sheet, which already stands at around 40% of GDP, will be approaching £ or 50% of GDP in size – an unprecedented figure in the Bank’s 327 year history (Figure 3). The robust operationalisation of those QE purchases has been crucial to the Bank’s mission over the past twelve years.

Ben Broadbent: Monetary policy, asset prices and distribution Speech by Mr Ben Broadbent, Deputy Governor for Monetary Policy of the Bank of England, at the Society of Business Economists Annual Conference, London, 23 October 2014. *  *  *  I would like to thank Alina Barnett for research assistance and I am also grateful for helpful comments from other colleagues in particular from Richard Harrison, David Learmonth and Gareth Ramsay. The views expressed are my own and do not necessarily reflect those of the Bank of England or other members of the Monetary Policy Committee. A few years ago, I used to take the overground train into work. The line was cluttered with stations – mine was barely 400 yards on from the previous stop. So you can understand why my fellow commuters were less than convinced one morning when, seeking to explain why our train was 20 minutes overdue, the driver said this was “because we left the last station late”. It raised a smile. But it wasn’t an explanation. I confess I have a similar reaction to accounts that seek to “explain” low interest rates, and the behaviour of asset prices more generally, solely by reference to what central banks have done. This is especially true when those accounts go on to attribute significant and lasting redistributive effects to these policies. For example, and at least when they happen to be going up, it’s quite common to hear that equity markets are benefiting from “easy money”.
In the case of the SNB, foreign currency investments have increased substantially as a result of foreign exchange interventions. This has exposed the SNB to a substantial exchange rate risk, which is a consequence of monetary policy considerations. Consequently, it is one that the SNB must take. We reduce the risks through suitable diversification of our foreign currency investments. However, the primacy of monetary policy means that our scope for diversification is limited.4 Additional risks in connection with zero interest rate policies can result from the fact that it has become very difficult for investors to achieve a satisfactory return on bonds. There is a danger that investors seeking an attractive yield will become imprudent and take excessive risks. The longer a low interest rate phase, the greater the danger of unintended consequences in the form of speculative price developments and misallocations. We have been observing a substantial increase in real estate prices in Switzerland for some years now, with strong growth in mortgage loans. The SNB has repeatedly expressed its concern over these developments. Prolonged low-interest phases also present the insurance industry and pension funds with considerable challenges. It goes without saying that central banks continually evaluate and reassess the effects and risks of monetary policy in the light of the most recent data. This applies in normal times and even more so in exceptional situations such as we have experienced over the past few years.

This is to supplement the central banks’ instruments in such a way that – alongside the maintenance of price stability – central banks can also make a greater contribution to financial stability than they have done in the past. The specific tools being referred to here are the macroprudential instruments that have attracted increasing interest in recent years, and that have been introduced in many countries. Such instruments can be used in a supplementary manner, as required. In the case of Switzerland, the SNB has a statutory mandate to pursue a monetary policy serving the interests of the country as a whole, to ensure price stability and in so doing, to take due account of the development of the economy. Within this primary framework, it also has the task of contributing to the stability of the financial system. There is no contradiction between these tasks if target hierarchy is observed. As far as financial stability is concerned, the SNB works closely together with the Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority and the Federal Department of Finance to create a regulatory environment that promotes stability. The SNB concentrates on the macroeconomic and macroprudential aspects of regulation. For the macroprudential tasks, a new instrument was created this year – the countercyclical capital buffer. According to the relevant regulation, this buffer can be activated by the Federal Council following a proposal by the SNB.
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.

In addition, in view of fierce competition on the labour market and the changes referred to above, the risk of growing wage demands is limited, and so are the so-called second-round effects. Re 3) Over the past three decades, the financial sector has become highly international. Financial services, provided under strictly regulated, separate, domestic financial systems in the past, are now provided under ever more open, competitive and global system. One of the measures of globalisation in the financial services sector is the growing volume of cross-border capital flows. Cross-border transactions in the bonds and shares segment are now exceeding 90 trillion (thousand billion) US dollars per annum, which translates into USD 250 billion daily 13 . Moreover, the size of financial markets and their meaning to the global economy becomes ever greater. According to McKinsey Global Institute 14 , the total value of global financial assets is now USD 118 trillion, whilst as far back as in 1980 they were only 12 trillion. The increase in the volume of financial assets is progressing at a higher rate than that of output, and has now reached a threefold of the global GDP, whilst back in 1980 it was approximately equal to the world output. Additionally, the fastest growing segment of the financial market is the segment of private debt securities. What is more, international issues of these securities grow at a higher rate than domestic issues, which means that companies increasingly finance their activities from funds raised abroad.
Are debt and credit – I will be using these terms to describe a single phenomenon in the following – something positive or negative? Over the next hour, I would like to pursue this question from an economist’s perspective. Let me save you the suspense and reveal the result of my reflections with an analogy. Sustainable lending is like maintaining a healthy, well-balanced diet. Food is one of the pillars of our life. In equal measure, lending is a pillar of a thriving economy. However, eating unhealthy food or eating too much produces only a short-lived sense of gratification and is likely to lead to health problems in the long run. These will then have to be battled with tedious diets or even medical treatment. In the same way, unhealthy or excessive lending can trigger crises. Far-reaching intervention by governments and central banks is then needed to bring the ensuing turmoil under control. Page 2/16  Ladies and gentlemen, this is what awaits you in today’s speech (cf. slide 3): First, I want to explain why a thriving economy depends on loans just as much as we human beings depend on food. Next, I would like to discuss why time and again, throughout history, there have been cases of gluttony at the ‘credit buffet’, and why these can have far-reaching consequences. Finally, based on current developments on the Swiss credit market, I will show up ways in which such downsides can be kept in check without curtailing the advantages offered by the credit system.

At the same time, the more they underestimate the risks they are taking in purchasing assets or in taking out or granting loans for this purpose. Alan Greenspan and Robert Shiller coined the phrase ‘irrational exuberance’ to describe situations when investors, in their enthusiasm, ignore the investment risks. 16 What creates these distorted expectations? Research in economic history and behavioural economics provides some explanations. The self-reinforcing dynamics between economic upturn, low interest rates, the rise in asset prices, and credit growth can induce market participants to feel justified in their optimism and their expectations of price developments. Government representatives, too, are often infected by this optimism. Who can predict the future? Perhaps there has indeed been a structural change in the economy. In other words: During an upturn, everyone finds ostensibly good reasons why a rise in asset prices and credit volume makes perfect sense and is fundamentally justified – despite historical experience to the contrary. 17 The feeling that this time really is different is something that I experienced at first hand myself, when I lived and worked in Washington DC from 1998 to 2006. Local real estate prices during this period recorded average annual growth rates of some 15%. During our stay there, we kept asking ourselves as a family – should we rent or buy? Our answer was always the same: Rent, because these annual price increases cannot be sustainable. However, this argument became ever weaker with each new year of sharp price rises.
But beyond that, it is not the ECB’s role to have additional involvement. What we have in the case of the European Union is additional responsibilities for crisis management, which are responsibilities of the governments in the euro area, not the responsibility of the ECB. Q. The Irish Central Bank has an emergency liquidity assistance programme. Do you think there could be a similar one for Greece or is there actually already one in place? I would not comment on emergency liquidity assistance. This is a national responsibility that each national central bank in the euro area may apply as is necessary in their own context. Q. Cypriot banks hold a sizeable quantity of Greek debt. How damaging or potentially damaging could that exposure be? Could the Central Bank have taken any steps to limit banks exposure to a single borrower? With respect to the exposure of Cypriot banks to Greek debt, we have examined the situation and we have come to the conclusion that even though there is exposure in our banking system, that exposure is manageable because our banks are very well capitalized. 4  BIS central bankers’ speeches  So even in the highly unlikely situation, if you wanted to run the counter factual, for example, of imposing losses on the holdings of Greek debt, our banks would manage to weather that. To understand how well capitalised our banking system is, a comparison may be useful. Our banks already meet the stricter capital requirements that are being phased in under Basel III.

The shared response to climate change: turning momentum into action Speech given by Sarah Breeden, Executive Director, International Banks Supervision, Bank of England  Based on remarks made on 19 March 2018 following the second formal meeting of the Green Finance Initiative and Green Finance Committee, London  Published 14 May 2018  1  All speeches are available online at www.bankofengland.co.uk/speeches  Introduction Thank you for the opportunity to explain what might otherwise not be obvious – why the Bank of England has an interest in climate change. In addition to outlining our interests, I shall stress how this is a shared challenge – where the private sector and the financial authorities need to work together, respecting our different mandates, if we are to rise to the challenge ahead. And in doing so I will pay tribute to the work you have done here in the China-UK Green Finance Taskforce. Turning momentum into action is imperative. The practical work you are doing in the Taskforce is key to making a real difference. Climate change, financial risk and the Bank of England’s objectives Climate change, and society’s response to it, presents financial risks which impact the Bank’s objectives. Those risks arise principally on two dimensions: the physical effects of climate change (for example from more frequent or intense storms); and the impact of changes as we transition to the lower-carbon economy that is consistent with the commitments made by governments in Paris two years ago.
For one thing, it may well happen that policymakers, in the light of new facts and figures on ongoing developments, come to the conclusion that the interest rate pattern currently followed needs to be corrected quite considerably. This would mean correcting a pattern that, from today’s vantage point, was not optimal in the past. For another, it may be desirable in certain situations to take the markets by surprise and cause expectations to be revised. Second, it is in the nature of the concept that the information content of a pre-announced interest rate target is much smaller with respect to the time dimension than used to be the case for money supply targets. Under the aspects of transparency and central bank accountability, this is a drawback. We have therefore taken effective countermeasures by defining price stability and deciding to publish our inflation forecast, thus submitting our decisions to public discussion. This has made it clear - and equally clearly communicated - how our actions are oriented and how they are to be measured. I have thus addressed issues that have all seen a particularly large number of changes in the past few years: independence, transparency and accountability. 3  BIS Review 35/2000  3. Independence - mandate - transparency  Independence Right into the 1980s, independent central banks were the exception - such as those of the US, Germany and Switzerland - rather than the rule. This has changed on a broad front in the past ten years.

Mr Bergström elucidates the economic situation in Sweden  Speech by Mr Villy Bergström, Deputy Governor of the Sveriges Riksbank, at the HSB Finance Day, HSB Bank, held in Stockholm on 18 November 1999. *  *  *  The prospects for the Swedish economy look better than for a very long time. We might have to go back several decades to find a period with such favourable conditions as those we are now experiencing. It is estimated that the Swedish economy will grow by as much as 3.6% this year, and the Riksbank forecasts that growth will be slightly higher next year. Despite the marked fall in production at the beginning of the 1990s, around 13% more is being produced now than at the end of the 1980s when overheating was worst. Part of the income from production has been used to pay off our foreign debt, which grew during the 1980s in a way that was unsustainable in the long term. This has been reflected in Sweden’s financial balance with other countries, i.e. the current account balance, which has been in surplus for a number of years and is expected to total SEK40 billion this year. After a number of years of large deficits, central government finances are now in surplus for the second year running. From having had the second worst central government budget balance in the whole EU at the beginning of the 1990s, Sweden’s public finances are now among the strongest in the union.