Debt and monetary policy: What conflicts in the future?
Given the high level of public and private debt and of banks’ bond holdings, central banks in OECD countries are forced to keep interest rates very low to prevent a borrower solvency and banking crisis. What types of conflicts around monetary policy could this policy, which is necessary to keep interest rates low, give rise to? The rise in labour costs and core inflation are currently modest; but we can imagine inflation returning, caused by different economic policies aimed at bolstering employees’ purchasing power, and linked to a change of political majorities in OECD countries. The return of inflation would force central banks to choose between staving off a debt crisis (even if there is inflation, the rise in nominal interest rates would worsen public finances in the short term - fiscal deficits would increase even if the public debt ratio dynamics was unchanged - and would inflict capital losses on bondholders) and combating inflation; Keeping interest rates very low can give rise to financial instability: further increase in debt, asset price bubbles. If central banks want to stave off a debt crisis, they will be forced to stop fighting financial instability, and to hope that macroprudential policies will do it instead.