Busy day at the Bank
All eyes will be on the Bank of England as we go on air at Noon today: as our opening titles run the Bank will announce its latest decision on interest rates -- expected to be another 50 basis points cut, taking the base rate to a new historic low of 0.5% (though after the huge cuts in rates in recent months it matters little whether this cut happens or not). More important, the Bank is expected to also confirm and begin its resort to
This is widely described as printing money -- but it's more complicated than that. Somewhat belatedly, because monetary economics is no longer fashionable, the Bank has realised that the supply of money in the economy has reduced to recession-inducing levels -- it's currently growing at less than 4%, which is the sort of level that leads to depression -- there just isn't enough of the stuff around to keep the economy ticking over. So it plans to do what the US Federal Reserve has already begun: the banks and big corporations hold a lot of government debt - gilts - and other kinds of debt on their balance sheets and the bank will start to buy them up, giving the banks and companies cash in return.
This is for two reasons: one, the hope is the banks and companies will use this cash to lend and spend, so that people and businesses will have more money in their pockets (though that is not a foregone conclusion), thereby increasing the money supply in the economy and getting it going again; two, by increasing the demand for gilts (because it is buying them up), the Bank will increase the price of gilts and this will have the effect (no time to explain, but trust me, it does) of reducing the yield (or interest rate) on them -- and that will add to overall decline in rates that the bank wants to see.
In the 21st century, the bank doesn't have to turn on the printing presses to do any of this -- a touch of the keys on its trading terminals will suffice, though it amounts to the same thing. In the first weeks of this year, the early signs from America are that the money supply is on the up. It will be several months before we know if it is working here too. Just as important, given that the eurozone is our major export market, the European Central Bank is also likely to embark on quantitative easing. The danger, of course, is that also this extra money sloshing about will lead to future inflation. At the moment, however, the central banks are more worried about deflation and quantitative easing is the last weapon in their locker for avoiding it.
We'll be talking to one of the Bank of England's former economists, Danny Gabay. We'll have the Chairman of the Treasury Select Committee, John McFall, and our guest of the day, throughout the programme is the cross bench peer, Karan Bilimoria.
Also on today's programme we'll be looking at the . It divided communities and defined industrial relations. We'll have both sides, the home secretary at the time, Leon Brittan and Kevin Barron, a former Miner and former member of the NUM, now a Labour MP. And we'll be looking at workers rights abroad.
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