空色一體
千江有水千江月，萬裏無雲萬裏天。
早在1997年IMF的香港年會上，IMF就已經開始嚐試著修改章程，以增強敦促各國走向資本市場自由化的能力。
這個時機選得令人叫絕：當時亞洲金融危機剛剛開始醞釀，而導致此次危機的一大主因，正是在一個根本不需要資本市場自由化的高儲蓄率地區，積極推行資本市場自由化。
鼓吹推行資本市場自由化的幕後推手，正是西方的金融市場和為它們賣命的西方各國的財長們。而對於2008年的全球性金融危機來說，導致它產生的主要原因，則是美國的金融去監管化，以及能夠將“美國製造”的創傷傳播到全世界其他地區資本市場的金融全球化。
2008年的危機表明，自由且無束縛的市場既不高效，也不穩定。在設定價格（看看地產泡沫）和匯率（無非是一種貨幣對另一種貨幣的價格）等方麵，這個市場的表現也不盡如人意。
冰島在處理本國危機時的經驗表明：以實施資本管製作為應對危機的手段，將有助於小國處理金融危機所帶來的衝擊。而美聯儲的“量化寬鬆”政策則證明，“無束縛的市場”這種思想是注定要失敗的：資金將流向市場眼中回報率最高的地方。
新興市場出現繁榮，而美國和歐洲則變得停滯。顯而易見的是，大部分新創造出來的流動性將想方設法流向新興市場。在美國信貸渠道依然不暢、大量的社區及地區性銀行仍然在苦苦掙紮的時候，情況尤其如此。
隨之而來的，則是資金大量地湧入新興市場。這意味著，即使在思想上反對進行幹預的財長和央行行長們，也不得不采取這項措施。事實上，已經有一個又一個的國家采取了這樣或者那樣的幹預方式，以避免讓本幣幣值急速提升。
如今，IMF要為這些幹預措施大開綠燈了，但它同時也依舊認為：幹預隻能作為無奈之下的情急之選。相反的是，我們應該從此次金融危機中得到這樣 的教訓：市場需要監管，跨界的資本流動非常危險。對其進行監管應該作為維持金融穩定性的關鍵部分，不到無可奈何的時候不動用監管，這樣隻能讓不穩定的局勢 更加惡化。
進行資本賬戶管理的工具多種多樣，如果能夠進行綜合采納，效果會更好。即便是這些工具最終未必能夠完全有效，但至少也比不進行管製要強。
更重要的變化是，IMF終於認清了不平等和不穩定之間的聯係。這場危機的主因之一，是美國試圖提振疲軟不堪的經濟，而其所使用的手段，卻是低利率和放鬆管製。這種過度負債行為的後果需要很多年才能消除。但正如IMF的另一項研究所顯示出來的那樣，這並不是什麽新伎倆。
這場危機還考驗了長期存在的另一個教條——將失業歸咎於勞動力市場缺乏彈性。像美國這樣的工資具有較高彈性的國家，比包括德國在內的北歐經濟體的表現要差得多。事實上，隨著工資的減少，上班族們會更加難以償還其所欠下的債務，從而讓房地產市場的問題進一步惡化。
大蕭條之前，美國經濟的不平等性十分嚴重。而2008年的危機以及為了應對它所采取的措施，所造成的收入方麵的不平等性，則有過之而無不及。這會使複蘇難上加難。美國正把自己引向一蹶不振，正如曾經的日本一樣。
但走出這種兩難困境，並不是不可能完成的任務。可行的方法包括加強集體工資討價還價能力、重組按揭貸款、用“胡蘿卜+大棒”政策促使銀行恢複借貸等一係列政策措施。
現如今，美國最頂端的1％打工者們掌握著全美四分之一的收入以及四成的財富。美國早已不再是“機會之地”，甚至連“老”歐洲都不如了。■
The IMF’s Switch in Time
05-23 13:44 Caijing
we should have learned from the crisis that financial markets need regulation, and that cross-border capital flows are particularly dangerous.
By Joseph E. Stiglitz
NEW YORK – The annual spring meeting of the International Monetary Fund was notable in marking the Fund’s effort to distance itself from its own long-standing tenets on capital controls and labor-market flexibility. It appears that a new IMF has gradually, and cautiously, emerged under the leadership of Dominique Strauss-Kahn.
Slightly more than 13 years earlier, at the IMF’s Hong Kong meeting in 1997, the Fund had attempted to amend its charter in order to gain more leeway to push countries towards capital-market liberalization. The timing could not have been worse: the East Asia crisis was just brewing – a crisis that was largely the result of capital-market liberalization in a region that, given its high savings rate, had no need for it.
That push had been advocated by Western financial markets – and the Western finance ministries that serve them so loyally. Financial deregulation in the United States was a prime cause of the global crisis that erupted in 2008, and financial and capital-market liberalization elsewhere helped spread that “made in the USA” trauma around the world.
The crisis showed that free and unfettered markets are neither efficient nor stable. They also did not necessarily do a good job at setting prices (witness the real-estate bubble), including exchange rates (which are merely the price of one currency in terms of another).
Iceland showed that responding to the crisis by imposing capital controls could help small countries manage its impact. And the US Federal Reserve’s “quantitative easing” (QEII) made the demise of the ideology of unfettered markets inevitable: money goes to where markets think returns are highest. With emerging markets booming, and America and Europe in the doldrums, it was clear that much of the new liquidity being created would find its way to emerging markets. This was especially true given that America’s credit pipeline remained clogged, with many community and regional banks still in a precarious position.
The resulting surge of money into emerging markets has meant that even finance ministers and central-bank governors who are ideologically opposed to intervening believe that they have no choice but to do so. Indeed, country after country has now chosen to intervene in one way or another to prevent their currencies from skyrocketing in value.
Now the IMF has blessed such interventions – but, as a sop to those who are still not convinced, it suggests that they should be used only as a last resort. On the contrary, we should have learned from the crisis that financial markets need regulation, and that cross-border capital flows are particularly dangerous. Such regulations should be a key part of any system to ensure financial stability; resorting to them only as a last resort is a recipe for continued instability.
There is a wide range of available capital-account management tools, and it is best if countries use a portfolio of them. Even if they are not fully effective, they are typically far better than nothing.
But an even more important change is the link that the IMF has finally drawn between inequality and instability. This crisis was largely a result of America’s effort to bolster an economy weakened by vastly increased inequality, through low interest rates and lax regulation (both of which resulted in many people borrowing far beyond their means). The consequences of this excessive indebtedness will take years to undo. But, as another IMF study reminds us, this is not a new pattern.
The crisis has also put to the test long-standing dogmas that blame labor-market rigidity for unemployment, because countries with more flexible wages, like the US, have fared worse than northern European economies, including Germany. Indeed, as wages weaken, workers will find it even more difficult to pay back what they owe, and problems in the housing market will become worse. Consumption will remain restrained, while strong and sustainable recovery cannot be based on another debt-fueled bubble.
As unequal as America was before the Great Recession, the crisis, and the way it has been managed, has led to even greater income inequality, making a recovery all the more difficult. America is setting itself up for its own version of a Japanese-style malaise.
But there are ways out of this dilemma: strengthening collective bargaining, restructuring mortgages, using carrots and sticks to get banks to resume lending, restructuring tax and spending policies to stimulate the economy now through long-term investments, and implementing social policies that ensure opportunity for all. As it is, with almost one-quarter of all income and 40% of US wealth going to the top 1% of income earners, America is now less a “land of opportunity” than even “old” Europe.
For progressives, these abysmal facts are part of the standard litany of frustration and justified outrage. What is new is that the IMF has joined the chorus. As Strauss-Kahn concluded in his speech to the Brookings Institution shortly before the Fund’s recent meeting: “Ultimately, employment and equity are building blocks of economic stability and prosperity, of political stability and peace. This goes to the heart of the IMF’s mandate. It must be placed at the heart of the policy agenda.”
Strauss-Kahn is proving himself a sagacious leader of the IMF. We can only hope that governments and financial markets heed his words.
Joseph E. Stiglitz is University Professor at Columbia University, a Nobel laureate in Economics, and the author of Freefall: Free Markets and the Sinking of the Global Economy.
