The case for austerity

I’m currently writing a 2,500 word essay on ‘UK Austerity’ for the magazine Economic Review. I think the idea of these magazine articles is to present a ‘balanced view’ so I’ve been looking up the case for austerity as well as the case against. As far as I can see the economic rationale for austerity …

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Economics A-Z

Macroeconomic notes Balance of payments Budget deficit Economic growth Fiscal policy Globalisation Exchange rates European Union The Euro Monetary policy Inequality Inflation International trade Supply side policies Unemployment Microeconomics notes AS Consumer and producer surplus Demand Economies of scale Elasticity Price elasticity of demand Cross elasticity of demand Income elasticity of demand Price elasticity of …

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Will China challenge the West?

Readers Question: 1. Does state capitalism as practised in China pose a fundamental challenge to the Western model of liberal-democratic capitalism? No, I don’t think so. From a political perspective, no matter how economic successful China might be, there will never be any enthusiasm to replicate China’s one party political system. In fact, it is …

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What economic lessons can we learn from Latvia and Estonia?

The Latvian and Estonian economies have recently experienced – an economic boom, a spectacular bust, and recovery. Their experience is a chance to evaluate the merits of fixed exchange rates, austerity and the issues of an economy based on trade and capital inflows. Aspects of the Baltic economies Boom period between 2000 and 2007 Great …

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Iceland’s Recovery

Iceland’s crisis was brutally severe. With a bloated current account deficit and bad debts, Iceland experienced a severe balance of payments crisis and banking losses. Iceland responded by: Not guaranteeing all banking debt. Many large banks failed and were seized by the government Allowing the currency to devalue by 50%. Imposed capital controls to prevent …

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German and Chinese Exports

Readers Question: how can Germany show a surplus? I mean I can understand that German exports have always been their main source of income , but with all the world exports shifting to China and India wouldn’t we expect the German exports to decline? Thanks! German Current Account Surplus Germany has a current account surplus. …

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How Did Portugal Reduce Current Account Deficit?

Readers Question: Can you tell what Portugal has done to reduce the Current Account GDP deficit so steeply? The reduction in the Portuguese deficit is quite striking. In researching the answer to this question, I came up with a different post – The Portuguese Economic crisis From what I can gather, essentially, the rapid reduction …

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Reforms of CAP

The Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) was designed to give farmers a guaranteed income and also to guarantee food supplies. This was achieved with minimum prices and import tariffs. However, the system of target prices. led to various economic problems. CAP CAP led to massive oversupply (Q4-Q1) Problems of CAP included High prices for consumers Incentives …

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