«10 gute Gründe für eine Entstaatlichung des Geldes»
«Why Do We Need Central Banks?»
Referat von Guido Hülsmann
Deutscher Ökonom und Professor an der School of Law, Economics, and Management, University of Angers
Die gegenwärtige Staatsschuldenkrise innerhalb der Eurozone wirft ein Schlaglicht auf einige grundlegende Probleme unserer Wirtschaftsordnung. Dabei ist von vorneherein zu betonen, dass wir – entgegen einer weit verbreiteten Auffassung – im westlichen Europa und in Nordamerika keinesfalls im Kapitalismus leben, jedenfalls nicht, wenn unter diesem Wort eine auf der Unverletzlichkeit des Privateigentums beruhende Wirtschaftsordnung gemeint sein soll. Wir leben vielmehr in einem stark interventionistischen System, und unsere Krise ist eine Krise des völlig aus dem Ruder gelaufenen Etatismus.
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Referat von Gerald O’Driscoll
Senior Fellow am Amerikanischen Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung
The question posed in the title of my paper will startle many. Central banks are institutions largely taken for granted even by monetary economists. In the 1930s, Vera Smith, a graduate student writing a Ph.D dissertation under Professor Hayek, examined the question. She concluded that “the superiority of central banking over the alternative became a dogma which never again came up for discussion was accepted without question or comment in all the later foundations of central banks” (Smith 1990: 167-68).
In my talk, I will re-examine the dogma in light of theory and history. A re-examination is timely for two principal reasons. First, the Federal Reserve and the European Central Bank have taken on extraordinary new responsibilities. Monetary policy is being transformed into fiscal policy in the form of credit allocation to key sectors and even countries. The Federal Reserve has been accused of industrial planning (Hummel 2011).
Second, controversies have emerged over the historical record and the independence of the Federal Reserve and other important central banks. Reviewing the historical literature, Selgin et al. (2012) find that the Fed’s performance in terms of standard measures is not what its supporters have claimed. This is true both in absolute terms (e.g., with respect to price stability) and in comparison to the pre-Fed era (post U.S. Civil War up to the eve of World War One). It is far from clear that the U.S. central bank has brought greater macroeconomic stability to the U.S. economy.
Cargill (2012) and others have questioned the economic literature on central bank independence. That literature suggests that more independent central banks do better in promoting price stability than do less independent central banks. Cargill argues that the literature misstates the nature of independence; misidentifies which central banks are independent; and does not correctly measure independence. A session at the January 2013 meetings of the American Economic Association will examine these and other questions relating to central bank independence. Taken together, these recent studies and others greatly undermine the received wisdom regarding central banks. My talk builds on the new literature on central banking.
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