growth in the making of monetary policy? in my view, the philosophy of john rawls is a most helpful guide here. one of his key insights, or one of his three principles of a just society, is that inequalities are acceptable only in case that they benefit the less well - off members of the society. 3 that is by no means a carte blanche for e. g. advocating tax cuts that benefit the richest or believing in some trickle - down theory of economic growth. but it implies that as the main impact of monetary policy in the proximity of effective lower bound has been to raise output and employment, and thus reduce income inequality by helping create millions of jobs and enhance the income of the previously unemployed and other less well - off members of the society, even if it had limited negative side - effects on wealth inequality, then the policy has been in line with the pursuit of a just society. 5. before concluding, i want to touch briefly on the issue of climate change and inequality. climate change mitigation and the needed green transition will play a major role in our economic policymaking going forward. as with all structural changes, there will be winners and losers. for a successful transition, we will need to pay close attention to distributional issues. while central banks are by no means the leading actors in climate change policy, we do have an important supporting role. in addition to ensuring that the financial system is resilient to climate - related financial risks, we must support an orderly economy - wide green transition. among other things, central banks have a role in helping societies understand the economic impacts of climate change. 6. to conclude, central banks must better understand how income and wealth inequality impact the transmission of monetary policy and take that into account in their policymaking. the greatest contribution central banks can make is to deliver on their price stability mandate, as this will also contribute to broad - based and inclusive employment growth. i am confident that the outcome of the ecb ’ s monetary policy strategy review will enhance the effectiveness of our monetary policy and thus also support the attainment of sustainable growth and full employment. 4 let me finish here. thank you for your attention and i look forward to our panel discussion and your questions. see e. g. lenza, m. and j. slacalek ( 2020 ). how does monetary policy affect income and wealth inequality? evidence from quantitative easing in the euro area. european central bank working paper series no. 219

olli rehn : fiscal statistics and fiscal rules - some lessons from recent years keynote speech by mr olli rehn, governor of the bank of finland, at the high - level seminar “ building trust – the role of supreme audit institutions in ensuring the reliability of fiscal data ”, organised by the national audit office of finland helsinki, 28 november 2019. * * * accompanying slides of the speech. ladies and gentlemen, i wish to thank the organisers for the invitation to address to such a distinguished audience and to so many european friends. i also want to congratulate the organisers for the choice of the venue, as the finlandia hall was the venue of the signing the final act of the csce ( conference on security and co - operation in europe ) in 1975. as a kid i started to follow the europe pretty much thanks to the csce. even your choice of the dinner venue is in line of this, since kalastajatorppa hosted the famous csce reception with the participation ranging from urho kekkonen to olof palme, valery giscard d ’ estaing to helmut schmidt, as well as harold wilson to gerald ford, not to speak leonid breznev to erich honecker. it is a historical fact that the csce final act was a one critical factor of creating the europe whole and free. in recent years, fiscal statistics have played a role in my professional life in various ways, when i have worked as member of the european commission, as finland ’ s minister of economic affairs, and as a central banker. as commissioner i was also responsible for eurostat in 2010 – 11, until i was appointed vice - president with stronger competences in fiscal surveillance, when we created a firewall inside the commission and separated these two functions. as you can probably imagine, data generally are very much present in a central bank governor ’ s typical working day. it starts with a quick look at most recent financial market data and continues with work based, to a large extent, on statistics, regarding particularly inflation and other macroeconomic developments. banking statistics play a special role, as for finland they are compiled by the bank of finland. the importance of fiscal data for us follows from the objectives given to the european system of central banks. the primary objective is price stability, and it cannot be achieved in the long run without fiscal sustainability. therefore, while the responsibility for fiscal policy obviously rests with the governments, central banks cannot ignore issues