We revisit the unintended consequences of the European Central Bank's (ECB) low-interest rate policies with a focus on the periphery countries of the European Union (EU) since the 2000s from a modern Austrian perspective. We argue that convergence expectations and the ECB's expansionary monetary...

This paper analyzes the effects of changes in interest rates on the composition of production in ten European countries during the boom period of the 2000s. We find that output elasticity differs across industries and across countries for similar industries. The paper suggests that in the run-up...

This paper explores the link between monetary policies of large industrial countries and international credit cycles. Based on an overinvestment framework, we show that in the prevailing asymmetric world monetary system, monetary policies of large centre countries can fuel credit booms in...

Since 2009, central banks in the major advanced economies have held interest rates at very low levels to stabilize financial markets and support the recovery of their economies. Based on a Mises-Hayek-BIS view on credit booms and Mises' law of unintended consequences, this paper suggests that...

As austerity policies are unpopular with voters and high levels of debt are a drag on growth a number of economists, most famously C. Reinhart and K. Rogoff, suggest that governments might have to consider financial repression as way out of the debt trap. We maintain that an exit from financial...

German Abstract: Wir argumentieren, dass die Entschuldung der Regierungen über eine ultra-lockere Geldpolitik bzw. finanzielle Repression, den Wohlstand in den Industrieländern nicht sichert. Der mit der ultra-lockeren Geldpolitik einhergehende graduelle Fall der Produktivitätsgewinne und die...

The paper sheds light on the link between the interest rate policy in large advanced economies with international funding and reserve currencies (the United States and the Euro Area) and the use of reserve requirements in emerging markets. Using reserve requirement data for 28 emerging markets...

The paper addresses some similarities and differences in the institutional set-up of the classical gold standard and European Monetary Union (EMU). I argue that giving up monetary nationalism and committing to the rules of either the gold standard or EMU initially seemed to restrict the scope of...

We show how since the mid 1980s expansionary monetary policies in the large economies and vagabonding liquidity have contributed to bubbles in the new and emerging markets. Based on the monetary overinvestment theories of Hayek and Wicksell we describe a wave of bubbles and crises that was...

Building upon the Austrian over investment theory it is argued that credit and asset market booms have emerged during phases of buoyant liquidity supply since the 1980s. We argue that major central banks have tended to lower interest rates too much for too long when bubbles burst and panic...