Vlieghe - Running out of room
Gertjan Vlieghe considers what we have learned in the past five years about some of the structural drivers of low interest rates, such as demographics, debt and the distribution of income.
He also discusses how to set monetary policy in a constrained environment, given the limited monetary policy space created by these structural factors.
Then he considers how these constraints could be lifted to ensure the effectiveness of future monetary policy.
Broadbent - Mismatch
In this speech, Ben Broadbent discusses mismatches between spending and supply, caused by the pandemic, in the UK and global economies.
Ben suggests that recent upward pressure on global goods prices is likely to be temporary, but there is some risk of longer-lasting frictions in the domestic economy. Developments in the labour market will be critical in assessing inflationary pressure in the medium term.
Haskel - Will the pandemic “scar” the economy?
Professor Jonathan Haskel explains how the Bank of England measures the long-term economic damage (known as scarring) that shocks like Covid can cause.
He argues that the economy will be less damaged in the long term, than we feared. This is because fewer jobs have been lost, and companies have invested more in their businesses than we thought they would at the start of the crisis.
But because there is so much uncertainty about the future, he thinks interest rates should not be raised at this point.
