{"id":19163,"date":"2016-03-24T20:06:09","date_gmt":"2016-03-25T01:06:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=19163"},"modified":"2016-03-24T20:06:09","modified_gmt":"2016-03-25T01:06:09","slug":"world-watching-as-canada-casts-aside-austerity-and-gambles-on-a-fiscal-surge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=19163","title":{"rendered":"World watching as Canada casts aside austerity and gambles on a fiscal surge"},"content":{"rendered":"
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World watching as Canada casts aside austerity and gambles on a fiscal surge<\/a><\/h3>\n<\/div>\n

A global economic debate plays out in Canada as our government goes from miser to spendthrift<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Canada's<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Finance Minister Bill Morneau are taking Canada into unknown waters, betting that spending will do what austerity has not. (Reuters)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Canada has abruptly switched sides in one of\u00a0the perennial political and economic battles over how to restart\u00a0a sagging economy.<\/div>\n
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To put it in a way that would not please either side, it is the contest\u00a0between the misers and the spendthrifts. After years of the penny-pinching approach, Canada\u00a0has switched tack to become a big spender.<\/p>\n

And despite some very strong feelings on either side, it is not absolutely clear which is the right\u00a0path to prosperity. The world will be watching.<\/p>\n

The clash\u00a0over the best\u00a0way to boost a moribund economy is by no means solely\u00a0a Canadian argument. Nor is it just\u00a0a modern debate.<\/p>\n

Historical debate<\/strong><\/p>\n

Countries from China and Japan, to Greece and Ireland have taken different views on the subject.<\/p>\n

Historically, the dispute has arisen repeatedly\u00a0\u2014\u00a0notably during\u00a0the Great Depression, when the first response of austerity was blamed for making the problem worse. But when governments then altered strategy, new spending failed to lead to a miracle recovery.<\/p>\n

\"JAPAN-ECONOMY\/CPI\"<\/p>\n

Despite monetary stimulus and negative interest rates, Japan’s economy has lapsed into deflation and economic stagnation. (Reuters)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

There is plenty of evidence on both sides. As I noted\u00a0back in 2010<\/a>, Japan and Ireland backed\u00a0opposing strategies. But the countries’ circumstances are so different it is hard to declare a\u00a0definitive winner.<\/p>\n

China and Greece\u00a0switched sides. Greece was driven by the ballot box toward bigger spending, then restrained by their stern European central bankers. China faced\u00a0alternating worries, first cutting back on fears of\u00a0overheating and then suddenly spurring new spending on fears of falling\u00a0growth.<\/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":"

World watching as Canada casts aside austerity and gambles on a fiscal surge A global economic debate plays out in Canada as our government goes from miser to spendthrift Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Finance Minister Bill Morneau are taking Canada into unknown waters, betting that spending will do what austerity has not. (Reuters) […]<\/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":[40,12351,103,3000,124,4936,240,431,4169,534,13105],"class_list":["post-19163","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-economics","tag-austerity","tag-bill-morneau","tag-canada","tag-cbc-news","tag-central-banks","tag-don-pittis","tag-economic-growth","tag-interest-rates","tag-justin-trudeau","tag-monetary-policy","tag-stimulas-spending"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19163","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=19163"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19163\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19164,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19163\/revisions\/19164"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=19163"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=19163"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=19163"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}