Stagflation
Encyclopedia
In economics, stagflation is a situation in which the inflation rate
is high and the economic growth
rate slows down and unemployment remains steadily high. It raises a dilemma for economic policy since actions designed to lower inflation
or reduce unemployment
may actually worsen economic growth.
The portmanteau stagflation is generally attributed to British politician
Iain Macleod
, who coined the phrase in his speech to Parliament
in 1965.
The concept is notable because, in the version of Keynesian macroeconomic theory
which was dominant between the end of WWII and the late-1970s, inflation and recession were regarded as mutually exclusive, the relationship between the two being described by the Phillips curve
. Stagflation is also notable because it has generally proven to be difficult and, in human terms as well as budget deficits, very costly to eradicate once it starts.
In the political arena one measure of stagflation termed the Misery Index
(derived by the simple addition of the inflation rate to the unemployment rate) was used to swing presidential elections in the United States in 1976 and 1980.
Second, both stagnation and inflation can result from inappropriate macroeconomic policies. For example, central banks can cause inflation by permitting excessive growth of the money supply
, and the government can cause stagnation by excessive regulation of goods markets and labor markets. Either of these factors can cause stagflation. Excessive growth of the money supply
taken to such an extreme that it must be reversed abruptly can clearly be a cause. Both types of explanations are offered in analyses of the global stagflation of the 1970s: it began with a huge rise in oil prices, but then continued as central banks used excessively stimulative monetary policy to counteract the resulting recession, causing a runaway wage-price spiral.
economists ignored the possibility of stagflation, because historical experience suggested that high unemployment was typically associated with low inflation, and vice versa (this relationship is called the Phillips curve
). The idea was that high demand for goods drives up prices, and also encourages firms to hire more; and likewise high employment raises demand. However, in the 1970s and 1980s, when stagflation occurred, it became obvious that the relationship between inflation and employment levels was not necessarily stable: that is, the Phillips relationship could shift. Macroeconomists became more skeptical of Keynesian theories, and the Keynesians themselves reconsidered their ideas in search of an explanation of stagflation.
The explanation for the shift of the Phillips curve was initially provided by the monetarist economist Milton Friedman
, and also by Edmund Phelps
. Both argued that when workers and firms begin to expect more inflation, the Phillips curve shifts up (meaning that more inflation occurs at any given level of unemployment). In particular, they suggested that if inflation lasted for several years, workers and firms would start to take it into account during wage negotiations, causing workers' wages and firms' costs to rise more quickly, thus further increasing inflation. While this idea was a severe criticism of early Keynesian theories, it was gradually accepted by most Keynesians, and has been incorporated into New Keynesian economic models.
from those that affect aggregate supply
. While monetary and fiscal policy can be used to stabilize the economy in the face of aggregate demand fluctuations, they are not very useful in confronting aggregate supply fluctuations. In particular, an adverse shock to aggregate supply, such as an increase in oil prices, can give rise to stagflation.
Neo-Keynesian theory distinguished two distinct kinds of inflation: demand-pull (caused by shifts of the aggregate demand curve) and cost-push (caused by shifts of the aggregate supply curve). Stagflation, in this view, is caused by cost-push inflation. Cost-push inflation occurs when some force or condition increases the costs of production. This could be caused by government policies (such as taxes), or from purely external factors such as a shortage of natural resources or an act of war.
needed to produce goods and services. Other factors may also cause supply problems, for example, social and political conditions such as policy changes, acts of war, extremely restrictive government control of production (For example monopolizing Dictatorships). In this view, stagflation is thought to occur when there is an adverse supply shock
(for example, a sudden increase in the price of oil
or a new tax) that causes a subsequent jump in the "cost" of goods and services (often at the wholesale level). In technical terms, this results in contraction or negative shift in an economy's aggregate supply curve
.
In the resource scarcity scenario (Zinam 1982), stagflation results when economic growth is inhibited by a restricted supply of raw materials. That is, when the actual or relative supply of basic materials (fossil fuels (energy), minerals, agricultural land in production, timber, etc.) decreases and/or cannot be increased fast enough in response to rising or continuing demand. The resource shortage may be a real physical shortage or a relative scarcity due to factors such as taxes or bad monetary policy which have affected the "cost" or availability of raw materials. This is consistent with the cost-push inflation factors in neo-Keynesian theory (above). The way this plays out is that after supply shock occurs, the economy will first try to maintain momentum — that is, consumers and businesses will begin paying higher prices in order to maintain their level of demand. The central bank may exacerbate this by increasing the money supply, by lowering interest rates for example, in an effort to combat a recession. The increased money supply props up the demand for goods and services, though demand would normally drop during a recession.
In the Keynesian model, higher prices will prompt increases in the supply of goods and services. However, during a supply shock (i.e. scarcity, "bottleneck" in resources, etc.), supplies don't respond as they normally would to these price pressures. So, inflation jumps and output drops, producing stagflation.
's imposition of wage and price controls on August 15, 1971, an initial wave of cost-push shocks in commodities was blamed for causing spiraling prices. Perhaps the most notorious factor cited at that time was the failure of the Peruvian anchovy fishery in 1972, a major source of livestock feed. The second major shock was the 1973 oil crisis
, when the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC
) constrained the worldwide supply of oil. Both events, combined with the overall energy shortage
that characterized the 1970s, resulted in actual or relative scarcity of raw materials. The price controls resulted in shortages at the point of purchase, causing, for example, queues of consumers at fueling stations and increased production costs for industry.
After the fact, and several years of research, a convincing explanation was provided based on the effects of adverse supply shocks on both prices and output. According to Blanchard (2009), these adverse events were one of two components of stagflation; the other was "ideas", which Robert Lucas
(famous for the Lucas Supply Curve), Thomas Sargent, and Robert Barro
were cited as expressing as "wildly incorrect" and "fundamentally flawed" predictions [of Keynesian economics] which, they said, left stagflation to be explained by "contemporary students of the business cycle
". In this discussion, Blanchard hypothesizes that the recent oil price increases could trigger another period of stagflation, although this has not yet happened (pg. 152).
view of the macroeconomy rejects the idea that monetary policy can have real effects. Neoclassical macroeconomists argue that real economic quantities, like real output, employment
, and unemployment
, are determined by real factors only. Nominal factors like changes in the money supply only affect nominal variables like inflation. The neoclassical idea that nominal factors cannot have real effects is often called 'monetary neutrality' or also the 'classical dichotomy
'.
Since the neoclassical viewpoint says that real phenomena like unemployment are essentially unrelated to nominal phenomena like inflation, a neoclassical economist would offer two separate explanations for 'stagnation' and 'inflation'. Neoclassical explanations of stagnation (low growth and high unemployment) include inefficient government regulations or high benefits for the unemployed that give people less incentive to look for jobs. Another neoclassical explanation of stagnation is given by real business cycle theory, in which any decrease in labor productivity
makes it efficient to work less. The main neoclassical explanation of inflation is very simple: it happens when the monetary authorities
increase the money supply too much.
In the neoclassical viewpoint, the real factors that determine output and unemployment affect the aggregate supply
curve only. The nominal factors that determine inflation affect the aggregate demand
curve only. When some adverse changes in real factors are shifting the aggregate supply curve left at the same time that unwise monetary policies are shifting the aggregate demand curve right, the result is stagflation.
Thus the main explanation for stagflation under a classical view of the economy is simply policy errors that affect both inflation and the labor market. Ironically, a very clear argument in favor of the classical explanation of stagflation was provided by Keynes himself. In 1919, John Maynard Keynes
described the inflation and economic stagnation gripping Europe in his book The Economic Consequences of the Peace
. Keynes wrote:
Keynes explicitly pointed out the relationship between governments printing money and inflation.
Keynes also pointed out how government price controls discourage production.
Keynes detailed the relationship between German government deficits and inflation.
', and treat the neoclassical model as a more appropriate description of the economy in the long run, when prices have sufficient time to adjust fully.
Therefore, while mainstream economists today might often attribute short periods of stagflation (not more than a few years) to adverse changes in supply, they would not accept this as an explanation of very prolonged stagflation. More prolonged stagflation would be explained as the effect of inappropriate government policies: excessive regulation of product markets and labor markets leading to long-run stagnation, and excessive growth of the money supply leading to long-run inflation.
and Shimshon Bichler
have proposed an explanation of stagflation as part of a theory they call differential accumulation
, which says firms seek to beat the average profit and capitalization rather than maximize. According to this theory, periods of mergers and acquisitions oscillate with periods of stagflation. When mergers and acquisitions are no longer politically feasible (governments clamp down with anti-monopoly rules), stagflation is used as an alternative to have higher relative profit than the competition. With increasing mergers and acquisitions, the power to implement stagflation increases.
Stagflation appears as a societal crisis, such as during the period of the oil crisis in the 70s and in 2006 to 2008. Inflation in stagflation, however, doesn't affect all firms equally. Dominant firms are able to increase their own prices at a faster rate than competitors. While in the aggregate no one appears to be profiting, differentially dominant firms improve their positions with higher relative profits and higher relative capitalization. Stagflation is not due to any actual supply shock, but because of the societal crisis that hints at a supply crisis. It is mostly a 20th and 21st century phenomenon that has been mainly used by the "weapondollar-petrodollar coalition" creating or using Middle East crises for the benefit of pecuniary interests.
emerged as a response to US stagflation in the 1970s. It largely attributed inflation to the ending of the Bretton Woods system
in 1971 and the lack of a specific price reference in the subsequent monetary policies (Keynesian and Monetarism). Supply-side economists asserted that the contraction component of stagflation resulted from an inflation-induced rise in real tax rates (see bracket creep)
maintain that creation of new money ex nihilo
benefits the creators and early recipients of the new money relative to late recipients. Money creation
is not wealth creation; it merely allows early money recipients to outbid late recipients for resources, goods, and services. Since the actual producers of wealth are typically late recipients, increases in the money supply weakens wealth formation and undermines the rate of economic growth.
"The increase in the money supply rate of growth coupled with the slowdown in the rate of growth of goods produced is what the increase in the rate of price inflation is all about. (Note that a price is the amount of money paid for a unit of a good.) What we have here is a faster increase in price inflation and a decline in the rate of growth in the production of goods. But this is exactly what stagflation is all about, i.e., an increase in price inflation and a fall in real economic growth. Popular opinion is that stagflation is totally made up.
"It seems therefore that the phenomenon of stagflation is the normal outcome of loose monetary policy. This is in agreement with [Phelps and Friedman (PF)]. Contrary to PF, however, we maintain that stagflation is not caused by the fact that in the short run people are fooled by the central bank. Stagflation is the natural result of monetary pumping which weakens the pace of economic growth and at the same time raises the rate of increase of the prices of goods and services."
, can be traced to the perceived failure of Keynesian policies to combat stagflation or explain it to the satisfaction of economists and policy-makers.
Federal Reserve chairman Paul Volcker
very sharply increased interest rates from 1979-1983 in what was called a "disinflationary scenario." After U.S. prime interest rates had soared into the double-digits, inflation did come down; these interest rates were the highest long-term prime interest rates that had ever existed in modern capital markets. Volcker is often credited with having stopped at least the inflationary side of stagflation, although the American economy also dipped into recession. Starting in approximately 1983, growth began a recovery. Both fiscal stimulus and money supply growth were policy at this time. A five- to six-year jump in unemployment during the Volcker disinflation suggests Volcker may have trusted unemployment to self-correct and return to its natural rate
within a reasonable period.
Inflation rate
In economics, the inflation rate is a measure of inflation, the rate of increase of a price index . It is the percentage rate of change in price level over time. The rate of decrease in the purchasing power of money is approximately equal.The inflation rate is used to calculate the real interest...
is high and the economic growth
Economic growth
In economics, economic growth is defined as the increasing capacity of the economy to satisfy the wants of goods and services of the members of society. Economic growth is enabled by increases in productivity, which lowers the inputs for a given amount of output. Lowered costs increase demand...
rate slows down and unemployment remains steadily high. It raises a dilemma for economic policy since actions designed to lower inflation
Inflation
In economics, inflation is a rise in the general level of prices of goods and services in an economy over a period of time.When the general price level rises, each unit of currency buys fewer goods and services. Consequently, inflation also reflects an erosion in the purchasing power of money – a...
or reduce unemployment
Unemployment
Unemployment , as defined by the International Labour Organization, occurs when people are without jobs and they have actively sought work within the past four weeks...
may actually worsen economic growth.
The portmanteau stagflation is generally attributed to British politician
Politician
A politician, political leader, or political figure is an individual who is involved in influencing public policy and decision making...
Iain Macleod
Iain Macleod
Iain Norman Macleod was a British Conservative Party politician and government minister.-Early life:...
, who coined the phrase in his speech to Parliament
Parliament of the United Kingdom
The Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is the supreme legislative body in the United Kingdom, British Crown dependencies and British overseas territories, located in London...
in 1965.
The concept is notable because, in the version of Keynesian macroeconomic theory
Keynesian economics
Keynesian economics is a school of macroeconomic thought based on the ideas of 20th-century English economist John Maynard Keynes.Keynesian economics argues that private sector decisions sometimes lead to inefficient macroeconomic outcomes and, therefore, advocates active policy responses by the...
which was dominant between the end of WWII and the late-1970s, inflation and recession were regarded as mutually exclusive, the relationship between the two being described by the Phillips curve
Phillips curve
In economics, the Phillips curve is a historical inverse relationship between the rate of unemployment and the rate of inflation in an economy. Stated simply, the lower the unemployment in an economy, the higher the rate of inflation...
. Stagflation is also notable because it has generally proven to be difficult and, in human terms as well as budget deficits, very costly to eradicate once it starts.
In the political arena one measure of stagflation termed the Misery Index
Misery index (economics)
The misery index is an economic indicator, created by economist Arthur Okun, and found by adding the unemployment rate to the inflation rate. It is assumed that both a higher rate of unemployment and a worsening of inflation create economic and social costs for a country...
(derived by the simple addition of the inflation rate to the unemployment rate) was used to swing presidential elections in the United States in 1976 and 1980.
Causes
Economists offer two principal explanations for why stagflation occurs. First, stagflation can result when the productive capacity of an economy is reduced by an unfavorable supply shock, such as an increase in the price of oil for an oil importing country. Such an unfavorable supply shock tends to raise prices at the same time that it slows the economy by making production more costly and less profitable.Second, both stagnation and inflation can result from inappropriate macroeconomic policies. For example, central banks can cause inflation by permitting excessive growth of the money supply
Money supply
In economics, the money supply or money stock, is the total amount of money available in an economy at a specific time. There are several ways to define "money," but standard measures usually include currency in circulation and demand deposits .Money supply data are recorded and published, usually...
, and the government can cause stagnation by excessive regulation of goods markets and labor markets. Either of these factors can cause stagflation. Excessive growth of the money supply
Money supply
In economics, the money supply or money stock, is the total amount of money available in an economy at a specific time. There are several ways to define "money," but standard measures usually include currency in circulation and demand deposits .Money supply data are recorded and published, usually...
taken to such an extreme that it must be reversed abruptly can clearly be a cause. Both types of explanations are offered in analyses of the global stagflation of the 1970s: it began with a huge rise in oil prices, but then continued as central banks used excessively stimulative monetary policy to counteract the resulting recession, causing a runaway wage-price spiral.
Early Keynesianism and monetarism
Up to the 1960s many KeynesianKeynesian economics
Keynesian economics is a school of macroeconomic thought based on the ideas of 20th-century English economist John Maynard Keynes.Keynesian economics argues that private sector decisions sometimes lead to inefficient macroeconomic outcomes and, therefore, advocates active policy responses by the...
economists ignored the possibility of stagflation, because historical experience suggested that high unemployment was typically associated with low inflation, and vice versa (this relationship is called the Phillips curve
Phillips curve
In economics, the Phillips curve is a historical inverse relationship between the rate of unemployment and the rate of inflation in an economy. Stated simply, the lower the unemployment in an economy, the higher the rate of inflation...
). The idea was that high demand for goods drives up prices, and also encourages firms to hire more; and likewise high employment raises demand. However, in the 1970s and 1980s, when stagflation occurred, it became obvious that the relationship between inflation and employment levels was not necessarily stable: that is, the Phillips relationship could shift. Macroeconomists became more skeptical of Keynesian theories, and the Keynesians themselves reconsidered their ideas in search of an explanation of stagflation.
The explanation for the shift of the Phillips curve was initially provided by the monetarist economist Milton Friedman
Milton Friedman
Milton Friedman was an American economist, statistician, academic, and author who taught at the University of Chicago for more than three decades...
, and also by Edmund Phelps
Edmund Phelps
Edmund Strother Phelps, Jr. is an American economist and the winner of the 2006 Bank of Sweden Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel. Early in his career he became renowned for his research at Yale's Cowles Foundation in the first half of the 1960s on the sources of economic growth...
. Both argued that when workers and firms begin to expect more inflation, the Phillips curve shifts up (meaning that more inflation occurs at any given level of unemployment). In particular, they suggested that if inflation lasted for several years, workers and firms would start to take it into account during wage negotiations, causing workers' wages and firms' costs to rise more quickly, thus further increasing inflation. While this idea was a severe criticism of early Keynesian theories, it was gradually accepted by most Keynesians, and has been incorporated into New Keynesian economic models.
Neo-Keynesianism
Contemporary Keynesian analyses argue that stagflation can be understood by distinguishing factors that affect aggregate demandAggregate demand
In macroeconomics, aggregate demand is the total demand for final goods and services in the economy at a given time and price level. It is the amount of goods and services in the economy that will be purchased at all possible price levels. This is the demand for the gross domestic product of a...
from those that affect aggregate supply
Aggregate supply
In economics, aggregate supply is the total supply of goods and services that firms in a national economy plan on selling during a specific time period...
. While monetary and fiscal policy can be used to stabilize the economy in the face of aggregate demand fluctuations, they are not very useful in confronting aggregate supply fluctuations. In particular, an adverse shock to aggregate supply, such as an increase in oil prices, can give rise to stagflation.
Neo-Keynesian theory distinguished two distinct kinds of inflation: demand-pull (caused by shifts of the aggregate demand curve) and cost-push (caused by shifts of the aggregate supply curve). Stagflation, in this view, is caused by cost-push inflation. Cost-push inflation occurs when some force or condition increases the costs of production. This could be caused by government policies (such as taxes), or from purely external factors such as a shortage of natural resources or an act of war.
Fundamentals
Supply theories are based on the neo-Keynesian cost-push model and attribute stagflation to significant disruptions to the supply side of the supply-demand market equation, for example, when there is a sudden real or relative scarcity of key commodities, natural resources, or natural capitalNatural capital
Natural capital is the extension of the economic notion of capital to goods and services relating to the natural environment. Natural capital is thus the stock of natural ecosystems that yields a flow of valuable ecosystem goods or services into the future...
needed to produce goods and services. Other factors may also cause supply problems, for example, social and political conditions such as policy changes, acts of war, extremely restrictive government control of production (For example monopolizing Dictatorships). In this view, stagflation is thought to occur when there is an adverse supply shock
Supply shock
A supply shock is an event that suddenly changes the price of a commodity or service. It may be caused by a sudden increase or decrease in the supply of a particular good. This sudden change affects the equilibrium price....
(for example, a sudden increase in the price of oil
Petroleum
Petroleum or crude oil is a naturally occurring, flammable liquid consisting of a complex mixture of hydrocarbons of various molecular weights and other liquid organic compounds, that are found in geologic formations beneath the Earth's surface. Petroleum is recovered mostly through oil drilling...
or a new tax) that causes a subsequent jump in the "cost" of goods and services (often at the wholesale level). In technical terms, this results in contraction or negative shift in an economy's aggregate supply curve
Supply and demand
Supply and demand is an economic model of price determination in a market. It concludes that in a competitive market, the unit price for a particular good will vary until it settles at a point where the quantity demanded by consumers will equal the quantity supplied by producers , resulting in an...
.
In the resource scarcity scenario (Zinam 1982), stagflation results when economic growth is inhibited by a restricted supply of raw materials. That is, when the actual or relative supply of basic materials (fossil fuels (energy), minerals, agricultural land in production, timber, etc.) decreases and/or cannot be increased fast enough in response to rising or continuing demand. The resource shortage may be a real physical shortage or a relative scarcity due to factors such as taxes or bad monetary policy which have affected the "cost" or availability of raw materials. This is consistent with the cost-push inflation factors in neo-Keynesian theory (above). The way this plays out is that after supply shock occurs, the economy will first try to maintain momentum — that is, consumers and businesses will begin paying higher prices in order to maintain their level of demand. The central bank may exacerbate this by increasing the money supply, by lowering interest rates for example, in an effort to combat a recession. The increased money supply props up the demand for goods and services, though demand would normally drop during a recession.
In the Keynesian model, higher prices will prompt increases in the supply of goods and services. However, during a supply shock (i.e. scarcity, "bottleneck" in resources, etc.), supplies don't respond as they normally would to these price pressures. So, inflation jumps and output drops, producing stagflation.
Explaining the 1970s stagflation
Following Richard NixonRichard Nixon
Richard Milhous Nixon was the 37th President of the United States, serving from 1969 to 1974. The only president to resign the office, Nixon had previously served as a US representative and senator from California and as the 36th Vice President of the United States from 1953 to 1961 under...
's imposition of wage and price controls on August 15, 1971, an initial wave of cost-push shocks in commodities was blamed for causing spiraling prices. Perhaps the most notorious factor cited at that time was the failure of the Peruvian anchovy fishery in 1972, a major source of livestock feed. The second major shock was the 1973 oil crisis
1973 oil crisis
The 1973 oil crisis started in October 1973, when the members of Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries or the OAPEC proclaimed an oil embargo. This was "in response to the U.S. decision to re-supply the Israeli military" during the Yom Kippur war. It lasted until March 1974. With the...
, when the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC
OPEC
OPEC is an intergovernmental organization of twelve developing countries made up of Algeria, Angola, Ecuador, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Libya, Nigeria, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Venezuela. OPEC has maintained its headquarters in Vienna since 1965, and hosts regular meetings...
) constrained the worldwide supply of oil. Both events, combined with the overall energy shortage
1970s energy crisis
The 1970s energy crisis was a period in which the major industrial countries of the world, particularly the United States, faced substantial shortages, both perceived and real, of petroleum...
that characterized the 1970s, resulted in actual or relative scarcity of raw materials. The price controls resulted in shortages at the point of purchase, causing, for example, queues of consumers at fueling stations and increased production costs for industry.
Theoretical responses
Under this set of theories, the solution to stagflation is to restore the supply of materials. In the case of a physical scarcity, stagflation is mitigated either by finding a replacement for the missing resources or by developing ways to increase economic productivity and energy efficiency so that more output is produced with less input. For example, in the late 1970s and early 1980s, the scarcity of oil was relieved by increases in both energy efficiency and global oil production. This factor, along with adjustments in monetary policies, helped end stagflation.Recent views
Until recently no macroeconomic policy had been able predict the occurrence of Stagflation.After the fact, and several years of research, a convincing explanation was provided based on the effects of adverse supply shocks on both prices and output. According to Blanchard (2009), these adverse events were one of two components of stagflation; the other was "ideas", which Robert Lucas
Robert Lucas, Jr.
Robert Emerson Lucas, Jr. is an American economist at the University of Chicago. He received the Nobel Prize in Economics in 1995 and is consistently indexed among the top 10 economists in the Research Papers in Economics rankings. He is married to economist Nancy Stokey.He received his B.A. in...
(famous for the Lucas Supply Curve), Thomas Sargent, and Robert Barro
Robert Barro
Robert Joseph Barro is an American classical macroeconomist and the Paul M. Warburg Professor of Economics at Harvard University. The Research Papers in Economics project ranked him as the 4th most influential economist in the world as of August 2011 based on his academic contributions...
were cited as expressing as "wildly incorrect" and "fundamentally flawed" predictions [of Keynesian economics] which, they said, left stagflation to be explained by "contemporary students of the business cycle
Business cycle
The term business cycle refers to economy-wide fluctuations in production or economic activity over several months or years...
". In this discussion, Blanchard hypothesizes that the recent oil price increases could trigger another period of stagflation, although this has not yet happened (pg. 152).
Neoclassical views
A purely neoclassicalNew classical macroeconomics
New classical macroeconomics, sometimes simply called new classical economics, is a school of thought in macroeconomics that builds its analysis entirely on a neoclassical framework. Specifically, it emphasizes the importance of rigorous foundations based on microeconomics...
view of the macroeconomy rejects the idea that monetary policy can have real effects. Neoclassical macroeconomists argue that real economic quantities, like real output, employment
Employment
Employment is a contract between two parties, one being the employer and the other being the employee. An employee may be defined as:- Employee :...
, and unemployment
Unemployment
Unemployment , as defined by the International Labour Organization, occurs when people are without jobs and they have actively sought work within the past four weeks...
, are determined by real factors only. Nominal factors like changes in the money supply only affect nominal variables like inflation. The neoclassical idea that nominal factors cannot have real effects is often called 'monetary neutrality' or also the 'classical dichotomy
Classical dichotomy
In macroeconomics, the classical dichotomy refers to an idea attributed to classical and pre-Keynesian economics that real and nominal variables can be analyzed separately...
'.
Since the neoclassical viewpoint says that real phenomena like unemployment are essentially unrelated to nominal phenomena like inflation, a neoclassical economist would offer two separate explanations for 'stagnation' and 'inflation'. Neoclassical explanations of stagnation (low growth and high unemployment) include inefficient government regulations or high benefits for the unemployed that give people less incentive to look for jobs. Another neoclassical explanation of stagnation is given by real business cycle theory, in which any decrease in labor productivity
Labor productivity
Workforce productivity is the amount of goods and services that a worker produces in a given amount of time. It is one of several types of productivity that economists measure. Workforce productivity can be measured for a firm, a process, an industry, or a country...
makes it efficient to work less. The main neoclassical explanation of inflation is very simple: it happens when the monetary authorities
Central bank
A central bank, reserve bank, or monetary authority is a public institution that usually issues the currency, regulates the money supply, and controls the interest rates in a country. Central banks often also oversee the commercial banking system of their respective countries...
increase the money supply too much.
In the neoclassical viewpoint, the real factors that determine output and unemployment affect the aggregate supply
Aggregate supply
In economics, aggregate supply is the total supply of goods and services that firms in a national economy plan on selling during a specific time period...
curve only. The nominal factors that determine inflation affect the aggregate demand
Aggregate demand
In macroeconomics, aggregate demand is the total demand for final goods and services in the economy at a given time and price level. It is the amount of goods and services in the economy that will be purchased at all possible price levels. This is the demand for the gross domestic product of a...
curve only. When some adverse changes in real factors are shifting the aggregate supply curve left at the same time that unwise monetary policies are shifting the aggregate demand curve right, the result is stagflation.
Thus the main explanation for stagflation under a classical view of the economy is simply policy errors that affect both inflation and the labor market. Ironically, a very clear argument in favor of the classical explanation of stagflation was provided by Keynes himself. In 1919, John Maynard Keynes
John Maynard Keynes
John Maynard Keynes, Baron Keynes of Tilton, CB FBA , was a British economist whose ideas have profoundly affected the theory and practice of modern macroeconomics, as well as the economic policies of governments...
described the inflation and economic stagnation gripping Europe in his book The Economic Consequences of the Peace
The Economic Consequences of the Peace
The Economic Consequences of the Peace is a book written and published by John Maynard Keynes. Keynes attended the Versailles Conference as a delegate of the British Treasury and argued for a much more generous peace. It was a bestseller throughout the world and was critical in establishing a...
. Keynes wrote:
- "Lenin is said to have declared that the best way to destroy the Capitalist System was to debauch the currency. By a continuing process of inflation, governments can confiscate, secretly and unobserved, an important part of the wealth of their citizens. By this method they not only confiscate, but they confiscate arbitrarily; and, while the process impoverishes many, it actually enriches some." [...]
- "Lenin was certainly right. There is no subtler, no surer means of overturning the existing basis of society than to debauch the currency. The process engages all the hidden forces of economic law on the side of destruction, and does it in a manner which not one man in a million is able to diagnose."
Keynes explicitly pointed out the relationship between governments printing money and inflation.
- "The inflationism of the currency systems of Europe has proceeded to extraordinary lengths. The various belligerent Governments, unable, or too timid or too short-sighted to secure from loans or taxes the resources they required, have printed notes for the balance."
Keynes also pointed out how government price controls discourage production.
- "The presumption of a spurious value for the currency, by the force of law expressed in the regulation of prices, contains in itself, however, the seeds of final economic decay, and soon dries up the sources of ultimate supply. If a man is compelled to exchange the fruits of his labors for paper which, as experience soon teaches him, he cannot use to purchase what he requires at a price comparable to that which he has received for his own products, he will keep his produce for himself, dispose of it to his friends and neighbors as a favor, or relax his efforts in producing it. A system of compelling the exchange of commodities at what is not their real relative value not only relaxes production, but leads finally to the waste and inefficiency of barter."
Keynes detailed the relationship between German government deficits and inflation.
- "In Germany the total expenditure of the Empire, the Federal States, and the Communes in 1919-20 is estimated at 25 milliards of marks, of which not above 10 milliards are covered by previously existing taxation. This is without allowing anything for the payment of the indemnity. In Russia, Poland, Hungary, or Austria such a thing as a budget cannot be seriously considered to exist at all."
- "Thus the menace of inflationism described above is not merely a product of the war, of which peace begins the cure. It is a continuing phenomenon of which the end is not yet in sight."
Keynesian in the short run, classical in the long run
While most economists believe that changes in money supply can have some real effects in the short run, neoclassical and neo-Keynesian economists tend to agree that there are no long-run effects from changing the money supply. Therefore, even economists who consider themselves neo-Keynesians usually believe that in the long run, money is neutral. In other words, while neoclassical and neo-Keynesian models are often seen as competing points of view, they can also be seen as two descriptions appropriate for different time horizons. Many mainstream textbooks today treat the neo-Keynesian model as a more appropriate description of the economy in the short run, when prices are 'stickySticky (economics)
Sticky, in the social sciences and particularly economics, describes a situation in which a variable is resistant to change. Sticky prices are an important part of macroeconomic theory since they may be used to explain why markets might not reach equilibrium right away. Nominal wages are often said...
', and treat the neoclassical model as a more appropriate description of the economy in the long run, when prices have sufficient time to adjust fully.
Therefore, while mainstream economists today might often attribute short periods of stagflation (not more than a few years) to adverse changes in supply, they would not accept this as an explanation of very prolonged stagflation. More prolonged stagflation would be explained as the effect of inappropriate government policies: excessive regulation of product markets and labor markets leading to long-run stagnation, and excessive growth of the money supply leading to long-run inflation.
As differential accumulation
Political economists Jonathan NitzanJonathan Nitzan
Jonathan Nitzan is a Professor of Political Economy at York University, Toronto, Canada. He is the co-author of Capital As Power: A Study of Order and Creorder, published 2009. Their writings focus of the nature of capital in capitalism and provide an alternative view to that of Marxist and...
and Shimshon Bichler
Shimshon Bichler
Shimshon Bichler is an educator who teaches political economy at colleges and universities in Israel. Along with Jonathan Nitzan, Bichler has created an engaging power theory of capitalism and theory of differential accumulation in their analysis of the political economy of wars, Israel, and...
have proposed an explanation of stagflation as part of a theory they call differential accumulation
Differential accumulation
Differential Accumulation is an approach for analysing capitalist development and crisis, tying together mergers and acquisitions, stagflation and globalization as integral facets of accumulation...
, which says firms seek to beat the average profit and capitalization rather than maximize. According to this theory, periods of mergers and acquisitions oscillate with periods of stagflation. When mergers and acquisitions are no longer politically feasible (governments clamp down with anti-monopoly rules), stagflation is used as an alternative to have higher relative profit than the competition. With increasing mergers and acquisitions, the power to implement stagflation increases.
Stagflation appears as a societal crisis, such as during the period of the oil crisis in the 70s and in 2006 to 2008. Inflation in stagflation, however, doesn't affect all firms equally. Dominant firms are able to increase their own prices at a faster rate than competitors. While in the aggregate no one appears to be profiting, differentially dominant firms improve their positions with higher relative profits and higher relative capitalization. Stagflation is not due to any actual supply shock, but because of the societal crisis that hints at a supply crisis. It is mostly a 20th and 21st century phenomenon that has been mainly used by the "weapondollar-petrodollar coalition" creating or using Middle East crises for the benefit of pecuniary interests.
Demand-pull stagflation theory
Demand-pull stagflation theory explores the idea that stagflation can result exclusively from monetary shocks without any concurrent supply shocks or negative shifts in economic output potential. Demand-pull theory describes a scenario where stagflation can occur following a period of monetary policy implementations that cause inflation. This theory was first proposed in 1999 by Eduardo Loyo of Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government.Supply-side theory
Supply-side economicsSupply-side economics
Supply-side economics is a school of macroeconomic thought that argues that economic growth can be most effectively created by lowering barriers for people to produce goods and services, such as lowering income tax and capital gains tax rates, and by allowing greater flexibility by reducing...
emerged as a response to US stagflation in the 1970s. It largely attributed inflation to the ending of the Bretton Woods system
Bretton Woods system
The Bretton Woods system of monetary management established the rules for commercial and financial relations among the world's major industrial states in the mid 20th century...
in 1971 and the lack of a specific price reference in the subsequent monetary policies (Keynesian and Monetarism). Supply-side economists asserted that the contraction component of stagflation resulted from an inflation-induced rise in real tax rates (see bracket creep)
Austrian School of Economics
Adherents to the Austrian SchoolAustrian School
The Austrian School of economics is a heterodox school of economic thought. It advocates methodological individualism in interpreting economic developments , the theory that money is non-neutral, the theory that the capital structure of economies consists of heterogeneous goods that have...
maintain that creation of new money ex nihilo
Ex nihilo
Ex nihilo is a Latin phrase meaning "out of nothing". It often appears in conjunction with the concept of creation, as in creatio ex nihilo, meaning "creation out of nothing"—chiefly in philosophical or theological contexts, but also occurs in other fields.In theology, the common phrase creatio ex...
benefits the creators and early recipients of the new money relative to late recipients. Money creation
Money creation
In economics, money creation is the process by which the money supply of a country or a monetary region is increased due to some reason. There are two principal stages of money creation. First, the central bank introduces new money into the economy by purchasing financial assets or lending money...
is not wealth creation; it merely allows early money recipients to outbid late recipients for resources, goods, and services. Since the actual producers of wealth are typically late recipients, increases in the money supply weakens wealth formation and undermines the rate of economic growth.
"The increase in the money supply rate of growth coupled with the slowdown in the rate of growth of goods produced is what the increase in the rate of price inflation is all about. (Note that a price is the amount of money paid for a unit of a good.) What we have here is a faster increase in price inflation and a decline in the rate of growth in the production of goods. But this is exactly what stagflation is all about, i.e., an increase in price inflation and a fall in real economic growth. Popular opinion is that stagflation is totally made up.
"It seems therefore that the phenomenon of stagflation is the normal outcome of loose monetary policy. This is in agreement with [Phelps and Friedman (PF)]. Contrary to PF, however, we maintain that stagflation is not caused by the fact that in the short run people are fooled by the central bank. Stagflation is the natural result of monetary pumping which weakens the pace of economic growth and at the same time raises the rate of increase of the prices of goods and services."
Responses
Stagflation undermined support for Keynesian consensus. The rise of conservative theories of economics, including monetarismMonetarism
Monetarism is a tendency in economic thought that emphasizes the role of governments in controlling the amount of money in circulation. It is the view within monetary economics that variation in the money supply has major influences on national output in the short run and the price level over...
, can be traced to the perceived failure of Keynesian policies to combat stagflation or explain it to the satisfaction of economists and policy-makers.
Federal Reserve chairman Paul Volcker
Paul Volcker
Paul Adolph Volcker, Jr. is an American economist. He was the Chairman of the Federal Reserve under United States Presidents Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan from August 1979 to August 1987. He is widely credited with ending the high levels of inflation seen in the United States in the 1970s and...
very sharply increased interest rates from 1979-1983 in what was called a "disinflationary scenario." After U.S. prime interest rates had soared into the double-digits, inflation did come down; these interest rates were the highest long-term prime interest rates that had ever existed in modern capital markets. Volcker is often credited with having stopped at least the inflationary side of stagflation, although the American economy also dipped into recession. Starting in approximately 1983, growth began a recovery. Both fiscal stimulus and money supply growth were policy at this time. A five- to six-year jump in unemployment during the Volcker disinflation suggests Volcker may have trusted unemployment to self-correct and return to its natural rate
Natural rate of unemployment
The natural rate of unemployment is a concept of economic activity developed in particular by Milton Friedman and Edmund Phelps in the 1960s, both recipients of the Nobel prize in economics...
within a reasonable period.
See also
- AgflationAgflationAgflation, a term coined in the late first decade of the 21st century, describes generalised inflation led by rises in Agricultural commodity prices. In the United States, agricultural prices are not generally factored into core inflation figures...
- BiflationBiflationBiflation is a state of the economy where the processes of inflation and deflation occur simultaneously. The term was first introduced by Dr. F. Osborne Brown, a Senior Financial Analyst for the Phoenix Investment Group...
- Deflation
- Economic stagnationEconomic stagnationEconomic stagnation or economic immobilism, often called simply stagnation or immobilism, is a prolonged period of slow economic growth , usually accompanied by high unemployment. Under some definitions, "slow" means significantly slower than potential growth as estimated by experts in macroeconomics...
- InflationInflationIn economics, inflation is a rise in the general level of prices of goods and services in an economy over a period of time.When the general price level rises, each unit of currency buys fewer goods and services. Consequently, inflation also reflects an erosion in the purchasing power of money – a...
- HyperinflationHyperinflationIn economics, hyperinflation is inflation that is very high or out of control. While the real values of the specific economic items generally stay the same in terms of relatively stable foreign currencies, in hyperinflationary conditions the general price level within a specific economy increases...
- InflationismInflationismIn economics, an inflationist or inflationary economic, fiscal, or monetary policy, is one that is predicted to lead to a substantial level of inflation. Similarly, an inflationist economist is one that advocates an inflationist policy...
- Stagflation in the United States
- ZIRP