Wenn Ideologiegebäude des 20. Jahrhunderts einfach einstürzen

Die Frankreich-Wahl zeigt erneut: Wir brauchen eine politische Ökonomie des 21. Jahrhunderts. Mit alten Rezepten lässt sich der Umbruch nicht managen.

 Josef Urschitz , diepresse.com

25.04.2017 um 19:42

Vor der Stichwahl in Frankreich tut sich auf wirtschaftspolitischem Gebiet Seltsames: Die europäische Linke fiebert praktisch geschlossen mit dem ehemaligen Rothschild-Investmentbanker (mehr „Klassenfeind“ geht wohl nicht) Emmanuel Macron mit, der die Staatsausgaben senken, den öffentlichen Dienst verkleinern, die Unternehmenssteuern reduzieren und die Dienstleistungen liberalisieren will. Ein Programm, das in diesen Kreisen normalerweise als neoliberales Teufelszeug gilt.

Und die europäische Rechte drückt ebenso geschlossen für Marine Le Pen und damit für eine Politikerin die Daumen, die ein klassisch linkes Wirtschaftsprogramm fahren will: Banken verstaatlichen, Sozialabgaben und Steuern für Wenigverdiener (und nur für diese) senken, Rentenalter auf 60 Jahre reduzieren, Kündigungen erschweren, die Maastricht-Verpflichtung zur Staatsschuldenbegrenzung aufheben.

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Germany’s Coming Silver Age

Michael Heise

Michael Heise is Chief Economist of Allianz SE and the author of Emerging From the Euro Debt Crisis: Making the Single Currency Work.

APR 25, 2017 Project Syndicate

MUNICH – Record levels of migration to Germany over the last two years have called into question the country’s demographic projections. But Germany’s rapid shift to a more favorable profile is not a reason to postpone politically painful policy decisions about retirement and pensions.

At the beginning of this century, forecasts that were considered reliable predicted that Germany would lose more than ten million inhabitants by 2050, owing to declining immigration and a low average birth rate. Today, population projections are significantly brighter. According to the government’s latest calculations, Germany’s population could remain above 80 million until 2060, and the reduction in the labor supply might not be as drastic as was previously feared.

Demographic forecasts needed to be corrected significantly, because the number of immigrants to Germany has fluctuated wildly and unpredictably, as opposed to emigration from Germany, which has remained relatively stable.

Inconvenient Truths About the US Trade Deficit

Martin Feldstein

Martin Feldstein, Professor of Economics at Harvard University and President Emeritus of the National Bureau of Economic Research, chaired President Ronald Reagan’s Council of Economic Advisers from 1982 to 1984. In 2006, he was appointed to President Bush’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, and, in 2009, was appointed to President Obama’s Economic Recovery Advisory Board. Currently, he is on the board of directors of the Council on Foreign Relations, the Trilateral Commission, and the Group of 30, a non-profit, international body that seeks greater understanding of global economic issues.

APR 25, 2017 Project Syndicate

CAMBRIDGE – The United States has a trade deficit of about $450 billion, or 2.5% of GDP. That means that Americans import $450 billion of goods and services more than they export to the rest of the world. What explains the enormous US deficit year after year, and what would happen to Americans’ standard of living if it were to decline?

It is easy to blame the large trade deficit on foreign governments that block the sale of US products in their markets, which hurts American businesses and lowers their employees’ standard of living. It’s also easy to blame foreign governments that subsidize their exports to the US, which hurts the businesses and employees that lose sales to foreign suppliers (though US households as a whole benefit when foreign governments subsidize what American consumers buy).

But foreign import barriers and exports subsidies are not the reason for the US trade deficit. The real reason is that Americans are spending more than they produce. The overall trade deficit is the result of the saving and investment decisions of US households and businesses. The policies of foreign governments affect only how that deficit is divided among America’s trading partners.

Who Is Marine Le Pen?

Christine Ockrent

Christine Ockrent is former Chief Operating Officer of France 24 and RFI.

APR 24, 2017 Project Syndicate

PARIS – I vividly remember French presidential candidate Marine Le Pen’s first appearance on television. It was just before the 2002 presidential campaign, and I had to moderate a debate on French public television. For political balance, we needed a representative of the far-right National Front (FN), then led by Le Pen’s father, Jean-Marie Le Pen. Bruno Gollnisch, the manager of Jean-Marie’s campaign and his heir apparent, turned us down, offering to send Marine instead.

It was obviously a trick played not just on a media viewed as hostile, but also on Le Pen herself – a rival whom Gollnisch resented for having been, in his view, unduly promoted by her father in the FN apparatus. Le Pen was a largely unknown 33-year-old lawyer with little practice, though she had an obvious instinct for the punch line. In the end, Gollnisch’s plan may have backfired: a few days after Le Pen’s appearance, the headline in a weekly magazine read, “What is new with the FN? Marine!”

Will London Survive Brexit?

Howard Davies

Howard Davies, the first chairman of the United Kingdom’s Financial Services Authority (1997-2003), is Chairman of the Royal Bank of Scotland. He was Director of the London School of Economics (2003-11) and served as Deputy Governor of the Bank of England and Director-General of the Confederation of British Industry.

APR 25, 2017, Project Syndicate

LONDON – Brexit has set a hungry cat among the financial pigeons of the City of London. No one yet knows what kind of access to the European Union’s single financial market UK-based firms will have, and Prime Minister Theresa May’s call for a general election to be held on June 8 has further clouded the picture, at least in the short term. But there is a nagging assumption that things cannot remain the same, and that there will be a price to be paid for leaving the EU.

So UK-based financial services firms, especially those that have chosen London as their European headquarters precisely in order to secure access to the whole EU market from one location, are reviewing their options. Indeed, regulators are obliging them to do so, by asking how they will maintain continuity of service to their clients in the event of a “hard” Brexit. (May’s government prefers to talk of a “clean” Brexit, but that is semantics).

Rival European centers have spotted an opportunity to claw some of this business back to the continent (or to Ireland). Other governments have long resented London’s dominance. It was galling to have to acknowledge that the principal center for trading in euro-denominated instruments lay outside the eurozone.

‘Apartheid Without the Racism’: How China Keeps Rural Folks Down

Date: 25-04-2017
Source: The Wall Street Journal

Old ‘hukou’ registration system blocks millions from benefiting from China’s continuing property boom

YANJIAO, China—An epic property boom restricted to city dwellers has opened a wealth gap that continues to widen in China, setting back a state campaign to ease poverty and shunting rural dwellers from the middle-class dream.

China’s system of hukou, or household registration, a decades-old legacy of the planned economy, binds most Chinese to their place of birth, and denies those outside China’s booming megacities the right to buy property inside them.

That has largely shut them out of one of history’s biggest wealth transfers: 98% of Chinese housing is now in private hands from virtually none a generation ago. Over the past decade, housing prices have increased as much as 700% in cities like Beijing and Shanghai. Property now accounts for 70% of personal wealth in the country.

French Vote Fuels Hopes for Growth

Date: 25-04-2017
Source: The Wall Street Journal

Emmanuel Macron’s rise as heavy favorite in race spurs investors to set aside political worries

The ascension of centrist Emmanuel Macron as the heavy favorite in France’s presidential race spurred investors to set aside the political worries that have long plagued European markets and to make new bets on economic growth.

Mr. Macron is now seen as the leader in May 7’s runoff against second-place finisher Marine Le Pen, whose pledge to dismantle the euro had damped prices of euro assets and the common currency itself.

The former investment banker’s good showing sent stocks and the euro sharply higher while triggering a sharp selloff in German government bonds, which investors had bought as a haven from populist politicians such as Ms. Le Pen. Mr. Macron won the first round with 24% of the vote, according to an official tally, ahead of Ms. Le Pen with 21.3%.