Entrevista com Ilan Goldfajn

Excelente entrevista com o Ilan, ex-Banco Central, no Estadão. Note, leitor, a importância da taxa de juros natural, um conceito antigo (Wicksell que o diga) e que andava sumido do debate porque, claro, as taxas de juros andavam lá pelos dois dígitos.

Cuidado para não fazer como muito leitor apressado que confunde taxa de juros natural com a taxa de juros. O “natural” aqui não tem nenhuma conotação “biológica”… Este trecho de artigo do FED de Dallas ajuda a clarear as idéias:

The money, or market, rate of interest is the observed rate at which banks carry on credit transactions. The natural rate is a bit more complicated. Wicksell variously defined it as the rate that is neutral for commodity prices and the rate at which the supply and demand for capital are in equilibrium in an economy not using money at all. The tie-in between Wicksell and the Austrians is straightforward: In the Austrian business cycle theory, a boom emerges when the natural rate of interest is higher than the market rate, which is subject to manipulations by humans using sophisticated financial institutions and credit instruments that drive the market rate below the natural, equilibrium rate.

This is Wicksell’s “cumulative process” model of business cycles. When the loan (market) rate of interest is below the natural rate, the demand for loans by entrepreneurs exceeds the quantity of savings in the economy. Banks expand credit by creating checking accounts (demand deposits) rather than by supplying savings, and an economic expansion occurs that must, other things being equal, drive up prices. Although Wicksell’s process does not demand a monetary change to begin, it is perfectly consistent with—and this is what the Austrians later emphasized— a lowering of the market interest rate through central bank monetary injections.

Ah sim, nós já falamos da taxa de juros natural – e de como mensurá-la – neste blog. Aqui e aqui.

About these ads