One of the features of the Brexit debate has been the role of the Bank of England in it. One thing that a supposedly independent central bank should do is avoid being accused of being on one side or the other of political debates. Also it has presented a view which is supposedly supported by the whole institution when with such a split nation that seems incredibly implausible. Thus the alternative view of independence and the reason for having external members, which is to provide different perspectives and emphasis, looks troubled at best.
On this road we see an organisation where all the Deputy-Governors are alumni of Her Majesty’s Treasury, which raises the issue of establishment capture. Also this from the Bank of England website suggests the use of another form of motivation to capture individuals.
Dr Ben Broadbent became Deputy Governor on 1 July 2014. Prior to that, he was an external member of the Monetary Policy Committee from 1 June 2011.
I am far from alone in thinking that this sets up all the wrong motivations and strengthens the power of the Governor via patronage. As to appointment of the absent-minded professor maybe one day he will demonstrate why unless of course we already know.
For the decade prior to his appointment to the MPC, Dr Broadbent was Senior European Economist at Goldman Sachs,
Mervyn King
There is something of an irony in the way that any sort of flicker of Bank of England comes from the former Governor the now Baron King of Lothbury although Bloomberg describe him without his new title.
Mervyn King, a professor at the New York University Stern School of Business,
If we move to his critique here are the details.
It saddens me to see the Bank of England unnecessarily drawn into this project. The Bank’s latest worst-case scenario shows the cost of leaving without a deal exceeding 10 percent of GDP.
Why is this wrong?
Two factors are responsible for the size of this effect: first, the assertion that productivity will fall because of lower trade; second, the assumption that disruption at borders — queues of lorries and interminable customs checks — will continue year after year. Neither is plausible. On this I concur with Paul Krugman. He’s no friend of Brexit and believes that Britain would be better off inside the EU — but on the claim of lower productivity, he describes the Bank’s estimates as “black box numbers” that are “dubious” and “questionable.” And on the claim of semi-permanent dislocation, he just says, “Really?” I agree: The British civil service may not be perfect, but it surely isn’t as bad as that.
The productivity issue is one that has been addressed at the Treasury Select Committee ( TSC) this morning. As I listened I heard Deputy Governor Broadbent tell us that productivity has been falling which is true but when it came to a rationale for further Brexit driven effects we got only waffle. Actually the Chair of the TSC Nicky Morgan was much more impressive by discussing the oil price shock of the 1970s as opposed to Ben Broadbent’s New Zealand based example from the same decade. Later questions on this subject had both the Governor and Ben Broadbent in retreat on the issue of how useful an example New Zealand will be especially as it coincided with a large oil price shock.
There are different arguments as to how long any Brexit effect would last. However one would expect at least some of the issues to decline and go away.
Bank of England evidence
If we move to this morning;s questions posed to the Bank of England there has been a clear attempt by Governor Carney to cover off the fire he is under with two methodologies.
- To say the Treasury Select Committee asked for the production of scenarios.
- To present it as a technocratic and scientific process where we were told 160 people were involved and 600, measurements were taken. We were guided towards some elasticities where the range was presented between 0.75 and 0.16 and told that 0.25 had been chosen.
He has a point with the first issue because they did do that when it would have been better to have asked the Office for Budget Responsibility. After all as it has been drawn from the same establishment base it would have been likely to have given similar answers if that was the purpose and kept the Bank of England out of it. The second argument is very weak as anyone familiar with the methodology knows that economic models depend more on the assumptions used than anything else. You do not need to know much about them to realise that they are an art form much more than they are a science. Usually of course a bad art form.
Next up was Deputy Governor Jon Cunliffe who has spent a career at HM Treasury as well as this described from the Bank of England website.
Before joining the Bank, Jon was the UK Permanent Representative to the European Union, effective from 9 January 2012.
When quizzed on this he told us this was in the past but a mere ten minutes later he was boasting about his experience. Sadly the inconsistency remained unchallenged as did his assertion that the higher cost of doing financial services business in Frankfurt as opposed to London was not going to be a major factor.
The issue of making this accessible came up with an MP just asking “I am looking for human speak” which added to a previous request for Governor Carney to talk like a human being rather than like an economist. This did not go especially well and to my mind left the interventions of the absent-minded professor as mostly waffle.
Sadly this from the Governor was not challenged though.
We are delivering price stability
Since inflation has been above its 2% per annum target for 18 months that is open to quite a bit of debate! That is before we get to the deeper issue of a 2% inflation target not being the price stability but is spun as. Also if we reflect that reality then one may be troubled by the next bit.
We will deliver financial stability.
Comment
There is a fair bit to consider here and as ever I do my best to avoid the politics and cover what has been said as accurately as I can as there is no official transcript yet. But let me return to an issue I raised last Thursday about the scenario where the Bank of England raises Bank Rate to 5.5% and other interest-rates go even higher.
BOE informing the masses. Carney tells
@CommonsTreasury that its controversial projection of Bank Rate going up to 5.5% on disorderly Brexit is mechanistic – a calculation from “a sum of squared deviations of inflation from target and output from potential.” Capiche? ( @DavidRobinson2k )
Nobody seems to have told the “squared deviations” that we are dealing with people who have consistently ignored deviations in inflation above target. Apparently though this is a complete success.
Carney adds that there was “a simpler, less-successful time”, when the Bank only focused on inflation…and we know how that turned out [it led to the financial crisis!].
That’s why we now have a financial policy committee to guard the economy, and that’s why the banks are ready for Brexit, the governor explains: ( The Guardian )