Beyond Growth: Fiscal and Monetary Policy to Achieve a Sustainable Inclusive Economy
Paper Session
Friday, Jan. 6, 2023 8:00 AM - 10:00 AM (CST)
- Chair: Gabriel Mathy, American University
Sustainable Zero Economic Growth: Accumulation and Social Norms
Abstract
A zero growth (of GDP) economy has some characteristics of a stationary state economy. Fontana and Sawyer (2021) outline a simple Post Keynesian macroeconomic model from which macroeconomic conditions for the achievement of zero growth were derived. The focus in this paper is on the economic and social conditions and behaviour which could underpin and sustain those conditions for zero growth. A first and major question raised is whether capitalist firms adjust their behaviour and their ‘animal spirits’ to be consistent with near zero net investment. Further, our model has implications for the rate of profit and will the capitalist system ‘accept’ low rates of profit. Working time and paid employment have to be consistent with the level of output; and specifically in so far as productivity continues to rise, even if at a slow rate, then how does working time adjust. In each case, the roles of price/tax, regulations, legislation and controls, and social norms (including the enforcement of norms) are considered. The underlying argument would be that there would not be ‘market forces’ which would guide growth of demand to zero. The general approach is to consider changes in social norms required to be consistent with sustained zero growth.The Moral Economy of Familial Care Labor: Valuing Unpaid Work Through Economic Structural Transformation and Demographic Change in Thailand
Abstract
Care is a common term embedded with moral meanings from the notions of duty and love (Esquivel, 2014; Folbre, 2012) and the care work is very often associated with women, particularly in the familial care context. The recent pandemic has reinforced the need for care provided by informal caregivers to their vulnerable family members including children and the sick, the elderly. How the family distributes its resources among members and assures their well-being has been the salience of intergenerational transfers not only for the family but also for the broader issues of social policy, social inequality (Kohli & Künemund, 2003). This study explore the changes in the distribution of worktime and caretime for different family members of Thai women and men across a 15-year period 2001-2015 along with the strong structural economic tranformations and a significant demographic change toward an aging society. We use mirco-level data of timeuse survey linked with labor forces surveys in four time periods 2001, 2004, 2009, 2014/15 to delve into those transformative and sluggish processes by valuing the unpaid childcare and adult care labor across the time using replacement and opportunity cost valuation methods (Suh & Folbre, 2016). Those changes are then contrasted with a unstable labor force participation trend and supply of Thai women at the same period to draw some policy agendas and institutional responses toward the recognition of unpaid care before it can be reduced and redistributed at multiple level following the 3R model (Elson, 2017) and care diamond framework (Razavi, 2007).Monetary Policy’s Impacts on Wealth and Employment in the US: Evaluating Distributional Outcomes by Race and Gender
Abstract
Many central banks have prioritized maintaining low inflation rates over the long term, which benefits those who hold wealth and penalizes wage earners. Women and minoritized groups in the United States are less likely to fall into the former category, with the median Black household owning about 10% of the wealth of the median white household. A growing body of work by feminist and post-Keynesian macroeconomists has investigated the distributional consequences of monetary policy along the dimensions of gender, race, and class. However, existing work has largely focused on the impacts of monetary policy on employment ratios. Wealth has received less attention, and much of this research preceded the unconventional monetary policies that followed the 2008 Financial Crisis. This project examines how monetary policy impacted wealth and employment inequality by race and gender in the US from the 1980s to 2019 by combining aggregated household-level data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics with other indicators. Drawing on methods established in previous work on this topic, a two-stage regression analysis will be used to estimate state-level impacts of monetary policy and thereby assess the relationship between interest rate changes and state employment and wealth ratios by race and gender. By evaluating the links between social stratification and purportedly identity-neutral monetary policy, this work seeks to inform ongoing conversations regarding the Federal Reserve’s role in addressing racial inequality.Direct Job Creation and Environmental Health in a Time of African American Disenfranchisement
Abstract
Under the guise of election integrity and fueled by false claims of fraud in the 2020 U.S. Presidential election, conservative lawmakers are threatening to pass voter suppression legislation aimed squarely at the Black American voter. These same voters grow tired of the unfulfilled promises of the Civil Rights era and the disinterest of politicians. At the same time, economists collaborating with community organizations and neighborhood associations work to direct public and private investment in neighborhoods. Such an approach, often identified with the environmental justice movement, has a long tradition in African American communities, as does the practice of working both ‘within’ and ‘outside’ the U.S. political system. Economic justice policies in the form of a jobs guarantee and reparations, and environmental justice policies for ecological and human health, must be the cornerstones of Black Political Economy’s inquiry and policy agendas. These are democratic, community-centered policies requiring engagement in partnerships with Black communities and voters on equal footing. Similarly, Black Political Economy must actively champion these approaches and policies among economists and policymakers. The direct job creation and community-centered development approaches are strategies to engage Black voters and ensure that their participation in the democratic process is justly rewarded.JEL Classifications
- E6 - Macroeconomic Policy, Macroeconomic Aspects of Public Finance, and General Outlook
- E5 - Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit