Putting Short Term Stability Before Long Term Growth: Fifty Years Is Enough

by Ben Fine

This article has been published as a Policy Brief (No. 12) by the Intergovernmental Group of Twenty-Four on International Monetary Affairs and Development (G24). Blog authors are grateful to the G24 for allowing it to reproduce it; copyright remains with the G24.

It is fifty years since Jean-Jacques Polak published his classic article “Monetary Analysis of Income Formation and Payments Problems” in the IMF Staff Papers. This paper provided the theoretical basis for the IMF’s financial programming, and continues to do so today. This is remarkable in and of itself. The world economy has gone through major changes over this period, as have corresponding fashions within economic theory as triumphant Keynesianism gave way to varieties of monetarism in the wake of the collapse of the post-war boom.

We also have had fifty years of development economics, during which there have also been shifting and competing perspectives from modernization through the Washington consensus and beyond, to notions of the developmental state, as attempts have been made to understand why the success of East Asian NICs should contrast so much with achievement elsewhere. Is it credible that across this material and intellectual ferment, the “Polak Model” should remain sacrosanct?

To his credit, Polak’s initial contribution was extraordinarily modest and qualified in its aims. He made it crystal clear that the main problem addressed is a temporary balance of payments deficit in a developing country, this gap usually the result of excessive domestic credit to fill the gap arising out of a fiscal deficit. He presumed that the only reliable data available are those concerning monetary variables, and that the only corresponding policy variable is control of the domestic money supply.

The model only seeks to determine the level of nominal income, with its distribution between the output level and the price level to be determined by some other means. In this respect, in principle, the model is not monetarist since it must violate one or other of the assumptions that prices are fixed (at the world level) or that output is fixed (at full employment). In practice, not without justification, financial programming is heavily associated with the ideology of monetarism because of the pessimistic stance taken on productive potential.

It has targeted balance of payments and/or fiscal deficits with shifting instruments across countries and over time as fixed exchange rates have given way to floating exchange rates, and control of inflation and liberalization of money markets have been emphasized more or less to suit. Today, for example, the IMF is more likely to advise appreciation of the exchange rate to bring down inflation in middle-income countries than to address foreign or fiscal deficits, although these remain a priority for low-income countries, especially in Africa.

One criticism of Polak is his making virtue out of necessity. Even if monetary variables are the only ones that can be measured and controlled, they are not necessarily best for remedial action. A patient with a broken leg is not best treated with a thermometer to take temperature and aspirin to bring it down, even if these are all that is available in the hospital. This apart, Polak can be judged to have appropriately sought, but failed, to constrain the use of his model for purposes for which it was not designed.

He did, for example, refine the model, in a joint article in 1971, by adding extra variables and equations. But, as was explicitly recognized within this contribution, this was nothing more than an elaboration of the Hicksian IS-LM-BP model, standard across every undergraduate textbook.

This prompts three observations. First and foremost, such a model was constructed in the context of developed countries, raising doubts over applicability to developing countries. Second, as has remained the case throughout the life of financial programming, the model cannot address issues of development as its scope is confined to the so-called short run, over which everything to do with development is taken as fixed. Third, it is ironic that the Polak model began to embrace Keynesianism explicitly just as the approach was falling into disrepute with the stagflation of the 1970s.

Significantly, in the second half of the 1980s, the IMF did seek theoretically to reconcile growth or development objectives with short-run macroeconomic adjustment in proposing a marriage between its Polak model and the World Bank’s growth model. Three further observations follow.

First, the model was fundamentally flawed, bound by export pessimism (as if the world economy did not grow) and leading to declining levels of productivity increase over time. In other words, it remained heavily bound to the short run, and essentially to zero per capita growth in the long run. Second, ironically, this was when new growth theory had begun to flourish, suggesting how productivity increase could be generated over time, but the marriage model was bound to old growth theory in which productivity increase is exogenously determined. And, third, Polak reacted strongly against any attempt to forge a marriage between financial programming (confined and only appropriate to the short run) and growth theory. Indeed, in a personal communication commenting on the marriage model, Polak suggests:

My view is that it is not a worthwhile project, and each subject should be approached on its own, provided the practitioners are fully aware of any recommended policies on the other objective (which to be sure has not always been the case between the Fund and the Bank). A possible simile, somewhat limping of course: the jobs of a schoolteacher and a paediatrician are both to do good to a child, and each should be aware of the other … but the professions should remain specialised for greatest efficiency in each field.

This is well and good as far as it goes, but it neatly sidesteps what has been a major criticism of the stabilization policies of the IMF and the structural adjustment policies of the World Bank, the negative impact of what is adopted in the short run on longer run performance. The latter is better seen as attached to an evolving economy over time, rather than as some given equilibrium around which appropriate policies are targeted. Polak, and his model, simply do not address this issue as he is only too aware.

The recent turn to poverty reduction has intensified the failure to observe the reservations that Polak has expressed over the use of his model. The first, and, for some time, the only model underpinning PRSPs uses financial programming as its organizing framework. It does so while assuming that there is a single labour market and full employment, thereby, for the convenience of the model, abolishing the major sources of poverty – unemployment and low wages -- in one stroke. This is even justified on the grounds that the model is universally and conveniently applicable across all countries.

It is certainly not the case that the Polak model for financial programming determines IMF policy. Indeed, it allows for considerable discretion. But it does set a framework within which policy is discussed, one which prioritizes the short term over the long run, and financial functioning and targets over the traditional concerns of development. It is time for a fundamental rethink and a new framework – one both recognizing, rather than subordinating itself to, increasing financial volatility, and genuinely engaging adjustment with developmental goals, with poverty alleviation and growth as starting points, rather than add-ons.

For a fuller discussion, see Ben Fine, "Financial Programming and the IMF", in B. Fine and K.S. Jomo (eds), The New Development Economics: After the Washington Consensus, Dehli: Tulika and London: Zed Press

Ben Fine is Professor of Economics at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, and Director of the Centre for Economic Policy for Southern Africa at SOAS. Recent books include “Social Capital versus Social Theory: Political Economy and Social Science at the Turn of the Millennium” (2001); “Development Policy in the Twenty-First Century: Beyond the Post-Washington Consensus” (2001); “The World of Consumption: The Material and Cultural Revisited” (2002); “Marx's Capital” fourth edition (2004); and “The New Development Economics: A Critical Introduction” (2006). His research interests include "economic imperialism" or the relationship between economics and other social sciences, especially social capital; the material and cultural determinants of consumption, particularly food; privatisation and industrial policy; and development theory and policy.

In Argentina, the Rich are Taking to the Streets

by Leandro Serino Some Argentineans have reverted to one of the country's favorite sports: reclaiming the streets. This time, however, streets and roads are not occupied by the unemployed or by civil servants or workers from declining industries. Instead, the protests come from agricultural producers and a selective group of Argentina's urban middle and upper classes; paradoxically, some of the groups who benefited most from the recent economic recovery.

The protests started when the government modified the export tax regime on March 11^th. To understand their causes, it is useful to look at the recent history of the application of a tax to Argentina’s exports of meat, soybeans, maize, wheat and related products. Export taxes were re-established in Argentina during the last economic crisis, in 2002. At the time, the rationale for the policy was simple. Argentina is an exporter of wage goods whose prices, like those of many other commodities, are determined in international markets. This means that, all other things being equal, the 200% nominal devaluation that took place in 2002 would have caused domestic food prices to skyrocket. In a context of massive unemployment and record poverty levels, it was necessary to truncate the link between international prices and domestic ones. And this is what export taxes actually do and did, for they establish a wedge between these two prices, thereby inciting local producers to sell to the domestic market.

(To have an idea of the problem this policy was trying to address, imagine -if you can- today's food price inflation, raising the concerns of international organizations such as the IMF, the World Bank and various Central Banks in both developed and developing countries, and multiply it by a three digit factor.)

The system had remained in place since then, with export taxes occasionally increasing. The second justification for this policy, even after the economic recovery, was not very different from the first one. The stable and competitive exchange rate policy implemented in Argentina (to counteract the de-industrialization experienced in the 1990s and promote new competitive sectors) is only politically sustainable in a wage-good exporter country if prices do not jump with a devalued exchange rate. Hence, until productivity and wages rise, export taxes have a role to play.

By the end of 2007, a third reason for the tax arose as increases in international food prices accelerated, fuelled by Asian giants’ economic growth, substitution of certain crops to produce fashionable biofuels, and even by speculation. The recent change to the export tax regime intends to address this new phenomenon, linking domestic prices to developments in international markets. (See ‘Mad, bad taxes on food’, The Economist, March 29^th-April 4^th, 2008)

This time, however, the change in export taxes is different from previous increases, for it establishes a scheme of moving export taxes. In the new regime, export taxes are not fixed but follow changes in international primary commodity prices, increasing when international prices rise and decreasing if international prices fall. In the current scenario of booming international prices, where the price of certain crops has almost (or more than) doubled in less than six months, modifications to the export tax system and the design of alternative policies (involving not only export taxes but also long-term policies for small agricultural producers and particular products, as well as countercyclical macroeconomic policies) were certainly necessary.

Protests started after the government announced the first type of policies (the change to the tax system). They emerged as a response to the lack of long-term policies for the agricultural sector, but also because, in a context of high international prices and expectations of further increases, flexible export taxes imply lower (extraordinary) benefits for the most profitable sector in the Argentine economy. The large amounts of present and future income at stake, taken for granted by some producers as a fair reward to their productive efficiency, thus represent the fundamental important reason behind the recent protests – which are likely to continue.

The dispute over extraordinary benefits, however, in no way justifies three weeks' of lock-out and piquetes affecting the entire Argentine population and especially its most deprived section. While it is fair to say that these benefits are in part a consequence of technical change and of the extension of the land frontier, they are also linked to a particular exchange rate regime and international context.

The conflict is still unresolved and open, and is transforming the distribution of ‘abundance’ as one of the fundamental political economy disputes of the 21^st century.

Note

Argentina’s newspapers cover this issue daily. See Pagina12, Clarin or La Nacion (in Spanish) and Buenos Aires Herald (in English).

Leandro Serino is a PhD Candidate at the Institute of Social Studies (ISS) in The Hague, where he also completed a Masters in Development Economics in 2003. In recent years, Serino devoted most of his time to his PhD research, which focuses on the question of structural change in countries with abundant natural resource endowments, like his own country Argentina. During his ‘free’ time, Serino participated in different projects in the fields of development economics and applied macroeconomics, at the University of General Sarmiento, the ISS, ECLAC Buenos Aires and the Ministry of Economy and Production of Argentina.

Brazil's Development Conundrum

by Paulo Gala Currently in Brazil heterodox economists form the majority in President Lula's government. This is a very different situation compared to Lula's first term. Brazilian Keynesians and development economists are now in key positions in the Brazilian Development Bank (BNDES), Finance Ministry, research institutes, at the World Bank and even the IMF. To name a few, Guido Mantega has been historically connected to developmentalism and so have economists in his team such as Nelson Barbosa. BNDES' president: Luciano Coutinho is one of the country's leading industrial policy specialists. Marcio Pochman, Joao Sicsu and a number of others are now the leading thinkers at IPEA: one of the most important government institutes for long term planning and research in the country. The Brazilian representative at the IMF, Paulo Nogueira Batista, is a long time critic of the Central Bank and neoliberal policies in Brazil. The President's small circle of influential advisors are also composed of hetorodox economists. Delfim Netto is a former USP (University of Sao Paulo) professor and was "czar" of the economy during the Brazilian miracle in the seventies. Luiz Gonzaga Belluzo is a former UNICAMP's (Universirty of Campinas) professor and long time critic of neoliberalism in Brazil. Conceicao Tavares is a former UFRJ's (Federal University of Rio) professor and has been advising the President since his first term. But the overwhelming presence of heterodox economists in these influential positions does not mean that developmentalist policies are comprehensively adopted. This is particularly because the central bank remains orthodox with total control over monetary and exchange rate policies. Though quantitatively in the minority these economists remain very powerful because of their close connection to the President and the fears of inflation that still haunt him. As some say, the Central Bank is the bunker of orthodox economists in Brazil today, the ones that survived from Lula's first term. Backed by the Bank's President Henrique Meirelles, these economists have been dictating key pillars of economic policy for a long time now. One cannot find a single economist close to a developmentalist viewpoint on the board of directors of the Central Bank. With a fully orthodox team, the central bank's main objective is to keep inflation under control. The result of this ambiguous composition of government is a twofold economic policy, as some have observed. Dialogue between the Finance Ministry and the Central Bank is harsh, to the extent that it exists at all. Policies adopted by the Ministry usually run in the opposite direction to what economists in Bank are doing. This has reached the stage where in a recent interview Guido Mantega mentioned that for every basis point of interest rate increase by the Bank, the Ministry levies taxes of the same amount on capital inflows to avoid exchange rate appreciation. This tax (the IOF) has been raised to 1,5% this year. It goes without saying that the economists in the Bank couldn't disagree more with these measures. The same phenomenon can be observed with respcet to fiscal policy. Through the new "Plano de Aceleração do Crescimento" (PAC) the central government has been increasing public investment in infrastructure, thus stimulating demand and growth. The Central Bank fears overheating of the economy and has been arguing for budget cuts, particularly with respect to government consumption. Actually, this is where most Brazilian economists seem to be in agreement. A cut in government consumption expenditure (as opposed to investment expenditure) would help manage aggregate demand. It would avoid the negative consequences of further interest rate hikes in the form of exchange rate appreciation and disincentives to investment in tradable sectors of the economy. President Lula doesn't seem to like this kind of reasoning, though. On April 16th, the Brazilian Central Bank decided again on the level of interest rates. There is a wide consensus among economists in the financial sector that the rate should be raised by at least 0.25 bps. According to some, inflation might be going out of control again. There is a chance that the target of 4.5% per year imposed by our inflation targeting system will not be met. According to the economists in the Finance Ministry there is no need to increase short term rates now because capital accumulation is growing strongly in the country (15% per annum). Installed capacity will increase in the near future which is the main guarantee for keeping inflation rates under control in the long term. But once again, the Central Bank and development economists don't agree on this. In conclusion, it seems fair to say that economic policy in Brazil has been split by the president into two often contradictory parts. The developmentalists in the Finance Ministry manage fiscal policy and the orthodox economists in the Central Bank manage monetary and exchange rate policies. The outcome of this arrangement will be neither developmentalist nor monetarist. Rather it will result in moderate growth and moderate inflation.

****

Paulo Gala received Master and PhD degrees in Economics from the Sao Paulo School of Economics, Getulio Vargas Foundation. He is the author of several papers, articles and book chapters on the following subjects: Macroeconomics, Development Economics and Economic Methodology. Currently, he is a professor at the Sao Paulo School of Economics, Getulio Vargas Foundation.pgala3@gmail.com