{"id":18243,"date":"2016-02-25T13:44:19","date_gmt":"2016-02-25T18:44:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=18243"},"modified":"2016-02-25T13:44:19","modified_gmt":"2016-02-25T18:44:19","slug":"everything-changes-at-zero","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=18243","title":{"rendered":"Everything Changes At Zero"},"content":{"rendered":"
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EVERYTHING CHANGES AT ZERO<\/a><\/h3>\n<\/div>\n<\/header>\n
\u201cThen said Jesus, \u201cFather, forgive them; for they know not what they do.\u201d\u201d
\n\u2013 Luke 23:34.<\/div>\n
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For the benefit<\/strong>\u00a0of non-subscribers, there are two versions of the Financial Times newspaper. One of them is the hard copy edition, still printed on pink paper, an exact digital replica of which is available on the paper\u2019s website to subscribers. The second is the website itself, at\u00a0www.ft.com<\/a>. The difference between the two is subtle, but crucial. In the formal, hard copy edition, \u2018reader response\u2019 is strictly edited and controlled. Occasionally a despatch critical of one of the paper\u2019s columnists (normally and deservedly Martin Wolf) will make its way through enemy lines, but as the \u2018edition of record\u2019, hostility to and criticism of the newspaper\u2019s editorial staff is, as you might expect, strictly rationed.<\/p>\n

On the website, however, the gloves come off.<\/p>\n

Last week the FT published an article, \u2018Central banks: negative thinking\u2019, co-authored by Robin Wigglesworth, Leo Lewis and Dan McCrum, that was atypically sceptical of the received wisdom on QE (i.e., that it works). The article began, as is probably compulsory these days, in Japan:<\/p>\n

\u201cForums have seen a flood of commentary from Japan\u2019s retirees decrying negative rates and the \u201ctorture\u201d that the BoJ\u2019s policy is already inflicting..<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Japanese can be conservative at the best of times, and few think these are the best of times.\u201d<\/p>\n

But as the authors rightly point out, Japan is not the only country affected by negative interest rates, a policy that John Stepek, the editor of MoneyWeek, has nicely called<\/p>\n

\u201cthe weaponisation of compound interest\u201d.<\/p>\n

As Messrs Wigglesworth, Lewis and McCrum rightly observe,<\/p>\n

\u201cWith quantitative easing seemingly losing its power to dazzle markets, and many governments either unable or unwilling to countenance raising spending, central banks have felt compelled to try new tools.\u201d<\/p>\n

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

EVERYTHING CHANGES AT ZERO \u201cThen said Jesus, \u201cFather, forgive them; for they know not what they do.\u201d\u201d \u2013 Luke 23:34. For the benefit\u00a0of non-subscribers, there are two versions of the Financial Times newspaper. One of them is the hard copy edition, still printed on pink paper, an exact digital replica of which is available on […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[124,7380,8262,452,534,558,662,1940,1939],"class_list":["post-18243","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-economics","tag-central-banks","tag-cobden-centre","tag-financial-times","tag-japan","tag-monetary-policy","tag-negative-interest-rates","tag-quantitative-easing","tag-zero-interest-rate-policy","tag-zirp"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18243","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=18243"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18243\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18244,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18243\/revisions\/18244"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=18243"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=18243"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=18243"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}