$ 77 billion, primarily by issuing new common equity, converting existing preferred equity to common equity, and selling businesses or portfolios of assets. none of the scap banks received cap funds. 3 many observers initially criticized the stress tests as overly optimistic. on the one hand, they noted that gdp growth was weaker and unemployment higher in 2009 than projected in the more adverse scenario. on the other hand, house prices did not fall as much as assumed under the more adverse scenario. as of the end of 2009, actual losses at the 19 banks were less than one - half of the two - year loss estimates under the more adverse scap scenario, and actual revenues were more than one - half of the two - year revenue estimates. nevertheless, there is wide variation across the firms, and it is too soon to tell whether firms will perform better over the full two years than the scap estimates. the lessons of the scap as i suggested at the outset of my remarks, i doubt that anything as ambitious as the scap would have been tried – at least as soon as it was – but for the exigencies of the financial crisis. yet the approach we took in the scap was informed by discussions that had been taking place among supervisors and academics for some time. not surprisingly, against the backdrop of the crisis, the scap experience elaborated and confirmed principles that had been advocated internally by some supervisors, but that had not been broadly incorporated into the practice of regulatory agencies. first, whether conducted by banks or supervisors, stress tests must consider severe but plausible scenarios, including low probability events with potentially highly adverse effects. in the period leading up to the crisis – characterized by strong profits, excess liquidity, and low credit losses – too many banks and regulators were skeptical of the possibility of a rapid and severe deterioration such as ultimately occurred in the u. s. housing, mortgage, and shortterm funding markets. if the crisis taught us anything, it is that we must test to the tail, not to the mode. a related point is that a stress test will be most useful if applied to the full range of credit and trading exposures. second, good management - information systems are critical to the ability of firms to manage their risks. assessing risk exposures across an entire organization is essential to understanding the potential effect of correlated risk exposures that may reside in distinct business lines as well as different legal entities and regulatory jurisdictions. yet during the scap, many of the banks were unable to

of 2019. among others, see k. coombs, a. dube, c. jahnke, r. klunder, s. naidu and m. stepner, early withdrawal of pandemic unemployment insurance : effects on earnings, employment and consumption, american economic review, papers and proceeding, 2022 ; a. dube, early withdrawal of pandemic ui : impact on job finding in july using current population survey, blog post ; n. petrosky - nadeau and r. valletta, ui generosity and job acceptance : effects of the 2020 cares act, frb sf working paper, 2021 ; e. forsythe, l. kahn, f. lange, and d. wiczer, where have all the workers gone? recalls versus reallocation in the covid recovery, nber working paper, 30387, 2022. l. coraggio, m. pagano, a. scognamiglio and j. tag, jaq of all trades : job mismatch, firm productivity and managerial quality. once it starts, such a spiral is difficult to stop. having said that, right now policymakers must act promptly and forcefully to counter inflation so that, looking ahead, workers ’ purchasing power is effectively and durably protected. otherwise, this arrangement will be difficult to sustain. the eurosystem has clearly indicated its determination to do what is needed. structural issues ageing and migration in the euro area, labour force participation increased considerably in the past few decades. various factors contributed to this development, including higher statutory retirement ages and the inflow of migrants, which typically have high participation rates. 6 going forward, longer life expectancy calls for longer working lives. given the current and projected age structure of the population, however, it seems rather unlikely that increased labour supply among the elderly will fully offset the impact of ageing on the labour force in the next decades. from an economic standpoint, sustained migration can balance the effect of demographics on the labour force and ease the pressure on the labour market. this is already apparent in certain segments of employment, where migrant labour predominates. the issue of migration is highly politically charged in many countries, and it is not appropriate for me to take a stand on the broader political issue. what i think i can say here is that, whatever one ’ s political preferences, the structure of migration policies can, in practice, make a significant difference in terms of