The Economist vnaša nekaj zdrave skepse v koncept sekularne stagnacije (obdobje trajno zmanjšane dolgoročne gospodarske rasti). Pred sekularno stagnacijo je že sredi 1930. let svaril tedanji predsednik ameriške zveze ekonomistov Alvin Hansen. Njegove bojazni, da bo svetovno gospodarstvo trajno raslo po nižjih stopnjah rasti, se niso uresničile (v največji meri najbrž zaradi nastopa 2. svetovne vojne, ki je bila, nehote, največji keynesianski stimulus za gospodarsko rast).

Tudi danes se vzroki za sedanjo depresijo med ZDA in Evropo razlikujejo. V ZDA gre najbrž za vpliv povečanih razlik v porazdelitvi dohodkov, ki so jih začasno krpali finančni baloni, v Evropi pa disfunkcionalnost obstoječe monetarne unije, ki vse države članice vleče v brezno. Ne glede na različne vzroke za depresijo oziroma nižjo rast, pa je dejstvo, da se obe zaradi trgovinske in finančne integriranosti obeh regij med seboj poganjata oziroma poglabljata. Če ZDA in Evropa ne bodo ustrezno odgovorile vsaka na svoje vzroke za trajajočo krizo, se cel svet ne bo uspel izvleči iz dolgega obdobja nizke rasti. Eksperimenta tretje svetovne vojne kot stimulusa za izhod iz depresije pa si najbrž nihče ne želi.

Advanced countries have struggled to make up the ground that they lost in the “great recession” that followed the financial crisis of 2007-08. America and Germany were relatively quick to regain lost ground but Britain has only just surpassed its pre-crisis GDP peak. And despite the support from generally strong German growth since the middle of 2009, the euro zone as a whole has failed to do so owing to a double-dip recession that lasted even longer than the first one and a subsequent feeble recovery that ground to a halt in the second quarter of 2014. The overall lack of progress has occurred even though interest rates are pinned to the floor and despite the stimulus from big quantitative easing programmes in Britain and America.

This suggests that something more fundamental has gone wrong than the usual down-phase of the business cycle. That misgiving was encapsulated when Laurence Summers, a prominent American economist, suggested last year that advanced economies might be suffering from “secular stagnation”. That term had first been coined by Alvin Hansen in 1938 to describe what he feared was the fate of the American economy following the Great Depression of the early 1930s: a check to economic progress as investment opportunities were stunted by the closing of the frontier and the collapse of immigration.

Hansen’s forebodings were proved to be quite wrong. Will a future generation look back at the musings of Summers and scratch their heads about how he could have been so gloomy? Or will they wonder at his prescience? A new e-book, which has just been published by VoxEU, adds to the debate that he sparked, featuring the views of around 20 economists, including Summers himself.

Vir: The Economist