The economic landscape has changed dramatically since the European fiscal rules were designed some 30 years ago. This column contributes to the debate on reform by proposing a two-tier fiscal framework combining an expenditure rule that accounts for the ECB’s inflation objective with a lower speed of adjustment under the Stability and Growth Pact’s debt rule.
A European Debt Agency could greatly help in implementing a new fiscal policy strategy in Europe. This column identifies fluctuations in bond prices over the past 20 years that such an agency could have prevented, and argues that the agency could absorb the entire euro area debt while reducing its size due to less volatile price dynamics. A European Debt Agency could be used
There have been various proposals for how to manage the sovereign debt portfolio accumulated by the Eurosystem in its efforts to raise inflation and provide emergency support in response to the pandemic. This column argues that the euro area needs a new mechanism to free the Eurosystem of the encumbrance of its sovereign portfolio. Such a mechanism cannot be provided by the
In January 2023, the escape clause triggered to suspend the rules of the Stability and Growth Pact will expire, possibly forcing painful fiscal adjustments in countries that are already struggling with the impact of the pandemic. In this second column in a two-part series, the authors focus on the debt management aspect of their proposal to strengthen the European fiscal