For manufacturing investment, the real interest rate is important for determining the viability of investment. Lower interest rates make it cheaper to borrow. Therefore lower interest rates tend to encourage business investment. High real interest rates discourage investment. How interest rates affect the efficiency of investment At lower interest rates, the marginal efficiency of capital …
This e-book concentrates on macro economics, issues such as economic growth, recessions, the credit crunch, inflation and globalisation. It also takes a look at economic history and also in-depth look at recent economic events such as the European debt crisis, deflation, and levels of government debt.
Updated Sept 2015.
A crucial issue at the moment is the state of the Chinese currency. Many feel that the Chinese government are manipulating the Currency to keep it undervalued. To keep the Renminbi undervalued the Chinese are selling their currency and buying dollar assets. The weaker Renminbi is good for Chinese exporters. It makes Chinese exports more …
Readers Question: how will central bank may increase the supply of money in economy? The money supply is the total amount of money available in the economy at a particular point in time. A narrow definition of money involves notes and coins. A broader definition includes cash plus bank and building society deposits. Policies to …
Readers Question: Does it (financial crisis) have any possible positive effects for the future? It is an opportunity to repair a broken financial system and put in safeguards to prevent future boom and busts. For example, we could have policies which banks automatically hold more deposits during a boom to provide counter cyclical instruments. Better …
To many people’s surprise, UK house prices have risen quite strongly in the past 12 months. If we look at the experience of Japan, United States, Ireland or Spain, it seems the experience of Britain is unusual. Countries like Japan and the US had a boom and bust in house prices, similar to the UK. …
A few people have asked why don’t government’s just default and not pay their debt back? Firstly, a government could effectively default just by printing money, creating inflation and making it easier to pay debt back. But, if the government does create inflation (print money) to pay off its debt or simply refuses to pay, …
Whilst the UK is slowly struggling out of recession – spare a thought for Greece, who are experiencing a real economic crisis – partly of their own making – and exacerbated by the straitjacket that EURO membership entails. The Greek economy has several significant problems Current account deficit of 14% of GDP – their exports …