9657040146f86f5010f72b00_ve1216c.jpg

The Japan Myth

For the second time in a decade, central banks around the world have responded to the collapse of an asset bubble by moving aggressively to ease monetary policy, a tactic explicitly justified by the need to avoid a Japanese-style "lost decade." The problem is, Japan never lost a decade.

BRUSSELS – The first decade of this century started with the so-called dot-com bubble.  When it burst, central banks moved aggressively to ease monetary policy in order to prevent a prolonged period of Japanese-style slow growth. But the prolonged period of low interest rates that followed the 2001 recession instead contributed to the emergence of another bubble, this time in real estate and credit.

https://prosyn.org/vg0ABaT