Category Archives: U.S.

The U.S. Position in the World Economy

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The election of 2016 in the U.S. saw the popularity of campaigning against international trade, foreign investments and immigration. Under the Trump administration the U.S. has implemented policies that mark a retreat from the globalization that was engineered during the 1990s and 2000s. What role has the U.S. played in the integration of global markets, and what happens if we withdraw?

Anthony Elson’s new book, The United States in the World Economy: Making Sense of Globalization, provides a thorough description and analysis of the position of the U.S. in the world economy. Elson, a former IMF staff member, shows that the U.S. retains a predominant position in international economic transactions. But the foreign sector is not as important for our domestic economy as it is for many other countries, and as a result its contributions to the domestic economy are often overlooked.

In international trade, for example, the U.S. share of global merchandise exports and imports lags China’s very narrowly, 11.46% versus 11.86% in 2015. But trade openness (the sum of exports and imports as a share of GDP) in the U.S. was 28%, lower than China’s openness of 40% and significantly less than Germany’s 86%. This disparity may explain the lack of attention paid to exports, while imports are seen as a threat. (One exception has been the agricultural sector, where China’s cutback of its purchases of U.S. soybeans and other products has forced the Trump administration to make payments to farmers).

Trump has cut back existing institutional arrangements, exiting the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and renegotiating the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). (However, its successor, the United States, Mexico and Canada Agreement (USMCA), does not substantively change the basic provisions of the earlier pact.) The administration actively uses tariffs as a tool of policy, often with little justification, and these inflict damage on the global economy. The U.S. agreement with China halts the scheduled escalation in trade measures but leaves in place tariffs that disrupt the domestic economy, leaving great uncertainty about the timing of the next stage. Training programs that could facilitate the movement of workers across sectors, on the other hand, have been underutilized.

Elson also documents the dominance of the U.S. dollar in international finance. The dollar is the most widely traded currency in foreign exchange markets. Currencies linked to the dollar represent about 60% of world GDP, which is much larger than the euro’s usage. About two-thirds of foreign central bank reserves are denominated in dollars; similarly, about 60% of global corporate debt is denominated in dollars. U.S. Treasury debt is the world’s safe asset, which allows the U.S. to fund its fiscal deficits more cheaply. But global finance only becomes relevant for many Americans in the event of foreign travel or study.

The one form of capital inflows that has attracted the attention of the current administration is foreign direct investment. The Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) is a governmental interagency committee that reviews investments in the U.S. that may have national security implications. CFIUS has become particularly interested in Chinese acquisitions of U.S. firms that may allow access to U.S.-developed technology, and has broadened its scope to include property acquisition. There is also some discussion on tightening the access of Chinese firms to U.S. financial markets.

Immigration, on the other hand, is an issue that arouses great public interest, and in many quarters, opposition. Elson reports that the U.S. has the largest number of immigrants—44 million—than any other country, and this group represents about one-fifth of the global immigrant population. But the migrants’ share of the total U.S. population of about 14% is less than that of many other nations. Canada’s migrants, for example, represent about 22% of its population, while Australia’s migrant share is 28%.

The consensus among economists who have studied the impact of immigrants on the U.S. economy is that migrant labor is a complement rather than a substitute for native workers. Any negative impact on domestic wages falls mainly on prior immigrants. While local communities bear the cost of increased services such as education, there are fiscal benefits at the federal level that come from taxes on migrant labor. Elson points out that in addition to the “immigration surplus” that accrues to the complementary workers and the firms that hire them, there are also long-run benefits arising from the positive impact of migrants’ entrepreneurship and innovations on economic activity.

But opposition to migration is a bedrock issue for the administration. Not only does it seek to curb illegal immigration through a border wall, but members of the administration want to revamp many of the provisions that govern legal migration. For example, family-related immigration may be reduced in favor of “merit-based immigration,“ which is related to education.  There is also opposition to the “diversity lottery,” which in recent years has allowed African migrants to enter the country. All these measures are under consideration as the native-born working population ages and there is a need for new workers.

The U.S., therefore, remains a major power in the global economy, but this position is often not understood at home. The benefits are often hidden, while the costs (sometimes fabricated) are widely publicized. Politicians find taking xenophobic positions, particularly on immigration, an easy way to court electoral support.

It is inevitable that the relative position of the U.S. in the global economy will continue to erode as that of other economies, particularly China’s, rise. But historian Adam Tooze of Columbia University writes that the two pillars of American power, global and military, remain in place. The primary threat to this hegemonic position, therefore, comes not from abroad but from shifts in long-established norms and policies. The international order abhors a vacuum, and an American retreat will be met by active counter-moves.

Is Inflation a Global Phenomenon?

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The persistence of inflation at relatively low rates despite years of monetary stimulus has led to wide-ranging investigations into its determinants. Traditionally the rate of inflation has been linked via a Phillips curve relationship to domestic factors, such as slack in the labor market. But is there also a global element?

Maurice Obstfeld, who has returned to UC-Berkeley from his post as chief economist at the International Monetary Field, examines some of the mechanisms by which global factors could affect U.S. inflation in a new National Bureau of Economic Research working paper, “Global Dimensions of U.S. Monetary Policy.” He reviews the evidence on the Phillips curve, and reports that there is little evidence that globalization has had a direct impact on the response of wages to unemployment. An indirect linkage, however, may exist through labor’s lower share of GDP, which could respond to foreign factors such as global supply chains. There may also be a relationship through the correlation of import prices and Consumer Price Index (CPI) inflation.

Another mechanism is based in the linkages of U.S. financial markets with those abroad. If these markets are integrated, then the natural rate of interest (r*) depends on foreign savings and investment as well as the domestic counterparts. An increase in foreign savings will lower the global r* which will stimulate domestic spending. Former Federal Reserve Board Chair Ben Bernanke claimed that this effect the cause of the housing boom in the U.S. that led to the global financial crisis.

Obstfeld points out this financial linkage is intensified by the status of the U.S. dollar as a safe asset and as a reserve currency. He also cites the special role of the U.S. currency as an invoice currency for international trade and a vehicle currency for cross-border lending. Consequently, actions taken to affect domestic spending have significant spillover effects.

Kristin Forbes of MIT also examined the role of global factors in the determination of prices in her Bank for International Settlements working paper, “Has Globalization Changed the Inflation Process?” In this analysis she uses three methodologies: principal components, the Phillips curve and trend-cycle decomposition. In the principal component investigation she looks at inflation in 43 advanced economies and emerging market countries from 1990 through 2017. She reports that 40% of the total variance in CPI inflation is explained by one common principal component. Moreover, this global component of CPI inflation has increased over time. On the other hand, the common component of core inflation (a measurement of inflation without volatile food and energy costs) is smaller and has fallen.

In the Phillips curve analysis, she includes changes in the real exchange rate, the world output gap, changes in oil and other commodity prices, and world producer price dispersion, with the domestic variables. The results for CPI inflation indicate that the foreign variables are significant in explaining inflation. The results for core inflation, however, do not show the same pattern of responses.

When Forbes tests the stability of the coefficients over time, she finds that the global output gap and world commodity prices, which were insignificant in the determination of CPI inflation at the beginning of the sample period, were significant during the period that began in 2007. But these changes are not seen when the measure of inflation is core inflation. As a further test, she compares the predicted changes in CPI and core inflation in regressions using the full set of variables and others with only the domestic variables. The results indicate that the models using the full set of coefficients do better in predicting both inflation rates than the domestic alternatives.

Finally, Forbes utilizes a “trend-cycle” approach that separates inflation into a persistent trend component and a cyclical component. She calculates these components of CPI and core inflation, and then investigates how the trend component and the variables in the Phillips curve analysis affect cyclical inflation. As in the Phillips curve results, she reports that most of the global variables are significant in the regressions for CPI inflation, but not core inflation. She also finds that there was a change in these relationships over time. But when she uses trend inflation as the dependent variable, she finds that the global variables are less significant, even with CPI trend inflation.

Forbes concludes that the evidence she has presented show that global variables should not be considered as ancillary in models of inflation dynamics. Moreover, these dynamics are evolving. Changes in the world output gap and commodity prices now have an impact on CPI inflation that was not evident before the most recent period. Whether or not they will continue to do so is a topic for future research.

Obstfeld’s and Forbes’ results pose a challenge for monetary policymakers. If it is difficult to formulate policies based on domestic economic conditions, it is even more so with foreign factors. This challenge is exacerbated by the constraints on central bank actions due to the current low levels of interest rates. Coordination among central bankers could provide some assistance, but it comes with its own limitations.

Even if the Trump administration is successful in scaling back the trade and financial ties of the U.S. with the rest of the world, inflation will continue to possess a global dimension. The cross-border integration of markets will not be reversed, and domestic prices will respond to foreign shocks. Central bankers are expected to avert another slowdown,  but their ability to maneuver the economy has become more constrained.

The Change in the U.S. Direct Investment Position

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The U.S. has long held an external balance sheet that is comprised of foreign equity assets, mainly in the form of direct investment (DI), and liabilities held abroad primarily in the form of debt, including U.S. Treasury securities. This composition is known as “long equity, short debt.” Pierre-Olivier Gourinchas of UC-Berkeley and Hélène Rey of the London Business School claim that this allocation has allowed the U.S. to serve as the “world’s venture capitalist,” issuing short-term debt in order to invest in high-yield assets. But the U.S. direct investment position has changed from a surplus to a deficit, with uncertain consequences for the international monetary system.

There is more than one reason for the change. To see this, it is important to understand that the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, which reports these data, uses several methods to value direct investment. One of these utilizes stock market prices to calculate the market values of the assets and liabilities. The second method is the use of the historical costs of the investments when they were made. The third is the current, or replacement, costs of the direct investment assets and liabilities.

Direct investment includes equity and debt instruments. The latter is based on intra-company borrowing. Historically, the equity component has registered a net positive position that outweighed the negative debt position. But the net direct investment equity position, which had been falling for several years, plunged in late 2017. The falloff continued in 2018 and led to a negative balance, which combined with the negative net direct investment debt position, turned the overall net direct investment balance negative.

What was the cause of the dropoff in direct investment equity? An examination of the assets and liabilities based on their market value shows both falling, with the decline in asset values outweighing a fall in the value of liabilities. These drops are based in large part on last year’s domestic and foreign stock market declines.

But an examination of the assets and liabilities valued at historic costs reveals that there was also a decline in direct investment assets. This fallback is due to the repatriation of earnings that U.S. based multinationals had accumulated and kept abroad in order to avoid paying corporate taxes on them. When changes in U.S. tax laws went into effect last year, many firms brought their earnings back, which led to negative U.S. direct investment outflows. Our direct investment assets fell, therefore, both because of the fall in their market value but also due to the reduction in U.S. foreign holdings. Inward investment, on the other hand, continued to grow.

What does this portend for the future? U.S. direct investment outflows became positive again in the second half of 2018. But they are unlikely to return to the same amounts as they had registered before the change in the tax laws due to concerns of the firms over U.S. trade policy. This year’s rising U.S. stock market will increase the value of our liabilities, most likely at a faster rate than the corresponding change in the market value of our assets. Consequently, the net debtor DI position will continue at least for the short-term.

This imbalance in our direct investment assets and liabilities contributes to the deterioration in the U.S. net international investment position. In addition, once the repatriation of foreign earnings is complete, the positive income we receive on our net foreign assets that partially offsets the deficit in the trade balance may fall. Moreover, the ability to serve as the world’s venture capitalist will weaken, which will affect our response to the next major financial crisis. The U.S. may not undertake the stabilizing role it has played in the past, and there is no other nation that can or will take on that role. At a time when the U.S. is withdrawing from political commitments that it has maintained since the end of World War II, this change is yet one more sign of a self-imposed diminution in our ability to deal with global issues.

(Note: a major thanks to the economists at the Bureau of Economic Analysis for guiding me through the data on direct investment.)

 

 

The U.S.: Inept Diplomacy, Indispensable Currency

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The announcements by several European governments that they would join the new Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) have been widely seen as indicators of the declining position of the U.S.  The AIIB had been proposed by China for the purpose of funding much-needed infrastructure projects in Asian countries. The U.S. had discouraged other governments from joining, ostensibly on the grounds that the new institution would overlap with the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank. But the real reason seemed to be a concern that the Chinese would have a regional forum to wield power.

The New York Times held both the Congress and President Obama responsible for mishandling the issue. The U.S. claimed it sought to ensure better governance in the new institution, but gave no signal of being willing to work with the Chinese and others to make the AIIB an effective agency. The continuing refusal of Congress to approve reforms in the IMF’s governance structure gives the Chinese and other emerging markets ample cause to look elsewhere. The Economist put it starkly: “China has won, gaining the support of American allies not just in Asia but in Europe, and leaving America looking churlish and ineffectual.”

And yet: the same issue of The Economist stated that “In the world of economics, one policy maker towers above all others…,”, and named Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen as holder of that position due to the sheer size of the U.S. economy. The influence of the U.S. in financial flows extends far outside national borders. A study by Robert N.McCauley, Patrick McGuire and Vladyslav Sushko of the Bank for International Settlements estimated that the amount of dollar-denominated credit received by non-financial borrowers outside the U.S. totaled $9 trillion by mid-2014. Over two-thirds of the credit originated outside the U.S., with about $3.7 trillion coming from banks and $2.7 from bond investors. The report’s authors found that dollar credit extended to non-U.S. borrowers grew much more rapidly than did credit within the U.S. during the post-global financial crisis period.

Almost half of this amount went to borrowers in emerging markets, particularly China ($1.1 trillion), Brazil ($300 billion), and India ($125 billion). In the case of Brazil, most of the funds were raised through the issuance of bonds, while bank lending accounted for the largest proportion of credit received by borrowers in China. Much of this credit was routed through the subsidiaries of firms outside their home countries, and balance of payments data would not capture these flows.

The study’s authors attributed the rise in borrowing in emerging markets to their higher interest rates. Consequently, any rise in U.S. interest rates will have global repercussions. The growth in dollar-denominated credit outside the U.S. should slow. But there may be other, less constructive consequences. Borrowers will face higher funding costs, and loans or bonds that looked safe at one interest rate may be less so at another. This situation is worsened by an appreciating dollar if the earnings of the borrowers are not also denominated in dollars. The rise in the value of the dollar has already prompted reassessments of financial fragility outside the U.S.

All this puts U.S. monetary policymakers in a delicate position. Ms. Yellen has made it clear that the Fed is in no hurry to raise interest rates. The Federal Reserve wants to see what happens to prices and wages as well as unemployment before it moves. The appreciation of the dollar pushes that date further into the future by keeping inflation rates depressed while cutting into the profitability of U.S. firms. While the impact of higher rates on credit markets outside the U.S. most likely has a relatively low place on the Fed’s list of concerns, Fed policymakers certainly are aware of the potential for collateral damage.

All this demonstrates the discrepancy between the diplomatic and financial power of the U.S. On the one hand, the U.S. must deal with countries that are eager to claim their places in global governance. The dominance of the U.S. and other G7 nations in international institutions is a relic of a world that came to an end with the global financial crisis. On the other hand, the dollar is still the predominant international currency, and will hold that place for many years to come. The use of the renminbi is slowly growing but it will be a long time before it can serve as an alternative to the dollar. Consequently, the actions of the Federal Reserve may have more international repercussions than those of U.S. policymakers unable to cope with the shifting landscape of financial diplomacy.

 

Can the U.S. Rebalance without Raising Inequality?

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Last week’s estimate of an anemic U.S. GDP first-quarter growth rate of 0.1% will be revised. Moreover, the good news regarding job growth in April suggests that the U.S. economy is expanding at a quicker pace in the second quarter. But a closer look at the first quarter data reveals a disturbing drop in investment and net exports that does not bode well for a reorientation of the U.S. economy.

The rise in economic activity was entirely due to a rise in consumption expenditures, which rose at annual rate of 2.04%. Gross private domestic investment expenditures, on the other hand, fell. Private nonresidential investment expenditures totaled $2.091 trillion, slightly down from $2.096 in the last quarter of 2013. Moreover, spending on new plants and equipment, when adjusted by GDP, reflects a continuation of a slow cyclical rise after the global financial crisis, with no sign of any acceleration:

Year

Private Nonresidential        Investment/GDP

Federal Budget/GDP

Current Account/GDP

2004

 11.92% -3.36% -5.06%

2005

 12.31% -2.43% -5.63%

2006

 12.82% -1.79% -5.74%

2007

 13.26% -1.11% -4.90%

2008

 13.19% -3.12% -4.61%

2009

 11.33% -9.80% -2.64%

2010

 11.09% -8.65% -3.04%

2011

 11.65% -8.37% -2.94%

2012

 12.13% -6.69% -2.70%

2013

 12.19% -4.04% -2.33%

An investment “dearth” (or “drought’) is not unique to the U.S. Antonio Fatas has shown that investment expenditures as a share of GDP have fallen in the advanced economies.   Restricted spending on new plants and equipment has been blamed for continuing low growth rates in these countries, presaging a new period of “secular stagnation.”

Stephen Roach, former chief economist at Morgan Stanley and currently a Senior Fellow at Yale University’s Jackson Institute, has another concern. In his recent book, Unbalanced: The Codependency of America and China, he writes about the breakdown of the pre-crisis growth models in the two countries. China’s rapid expansion was based on investment and exports, backed by high savings rates. In the U.S., on the other hand, consumption expenditures, financed in part by borrowing against rising home values, were the basis of the economy’s growth. The flows of goods and capital between the two countries established a pattern of co-dependency between them. But the crisis revealed the weaknesses of both patterns of spending, and the two countries need to rebalance and reorient their economies.

Roach believes that China is taking the first steps to change the structure of its economy. President Xi Jinping and Prime Minister Li Keqiang have pledged to increase the role of private markets in allocating resources. Economic growth will be based on domestic demand, which will be focused on consumer expenditures.  Success is not guaranteed, however, as there will be resistance from those who profited from the old export-dependent model and government control of the financial system. The government also faces daunting environmental challenges.

Roach is decidedly not optimistic about the ability of the U.S. to make the corresponding adjustments to its economy. While the deficit in federal budget has shrunk (see above), household savings remain too low. The U.S., he writes “…has ignored its infrastructure, investing in human capital and the manufacturing capacity.” The recent fall of the U.S. current account deficit could be reversed if consumption expenditures remain the engine of economic growth.

Roach is not alone in his concerns about the need for increasing national savings. Former Federal Reserve Chair Ben Bernanke raised the same issue in testimony to Congress last year. Raising savings rates during an economic recovery, however, is difficult, particularly given the slow decline of unemployment. Moreover, the work of Thomas Piketty and others on income distribution has drawn attention to a troubling aspect of this issue: savings are concentrated among the those in highest income brackets who hold such a large share of the wealth in the U.S. Many Americans live paycheck to paycheck, with little opportunity of funding individual retirement accounts to finance their retirements.

Raghuram Rajan, in Fault Lines: How Hidden Fractures Still Threaten the World Economy, pointed to the connection between the U.S. external position and growing inequality. While the U.S. economy has largely recovered from the financial crisis, the “fault lines” that Rajan wrote about still exist.  It will be a daunting challenge for the U.S. to increase national savings without reinforcing the “forces of divergence” that skew income distribution.

Group Therapy

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Pop quiz:  which U.S. policymaker said last week: “We can’t solve everyone else’s problems anymore” in response to foreign criticism of U.S. handling of what issue?

a—Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen, responding to criticism by foreign central bankers of the Fed’s tapering of its asset purchases;

b—Treasury Secretary Jack Lew, following denunciations of the refusal of the U.S. Congress to pass legislation that would enable IMF quota reform;

c—an anonymous White House aide, defending the Obama  administration’s  response to the turmoil in the Ukraine.

The correct response is c. But Ms. Yellen and Mr. Lew, who are attending the conference of G20 finance ministers and central bank heads in Sydney, might be forgiven if they held similar (but unspoken) sentiments.

The Federal Reserve has been criticized for not coordinating its policies with its peer institutions, particularly in those emerging markets that have had capital outflows and declines in equity market prices. But the critics have not spelled out precisely what they believe the Federal Reserve should do (or not do), given its assessment of the state of the U.S. economy. Domestic central banks respond to domestic conditions. In some cases, those conditions are linked to the global economy, and a central banker who ignored those linkages would only be postponing the implementation of stronger measures. But is that the case here?

The IMF came the closest to offering a specific criticism:

Advanced economies should avoid premature withdrawal of monetary accommodation as fiscal balances continue consolidating. Given still large output gaps, very low inflation, and ongoing fiscal consolidation, monetary policy should remain accommodative in advanced economies. There is scope for better cooperation on unwinding UMP, including through wider central bank discussions of exit plans.

Does anyone think that the Federal Reserve no longer intends to “remain accommodative”? Are more discussions the only missing element of the Federal Reserve’s plans? That would be surprising, since central bankers have many opportunities to speak to each other, and usually do.

The IMF did not let the emerging market countries off the hook:

In emerging market economies, credible macroeconomic policies and frameworks, alongside exchange rate flexibility, are critical to weather turbulence. Further monetary policy tightening in the context of strengthened policy frameworks is necessary where inflation is still relatively high or where policy credibility has come into question. Priority should also be given to shoring up fiscal policy credibility where it is lacking; subsequently buffers should be built to provide space for counter-cyclical policy action. Exchange rate flexibility should continue to facilitate external adjustment, particularly where currencies are overvalued, while FX intervention— where reserves are adequate—can be used to smooth excessive volatility or prevent financial disruption.

Critics are on firmer grounds when they criticize the U.S. for not passing the necessary legislation to change the IMF’s quota allocations. But perhaps they should not take their annoyance out on Mr. Lew. The U.S. Congress did not approve the needed measures for a number of reasons, none of them particularly compelling. Mr. Lew would be delighted to see the situation change, but that is unlikely to happen.

What, then, can be done at the G20 meeting? If allowing everyone to voice her or his frustrations with the U.S. serves some useful purpose, then all the air miles on the flights to Sydney will have been earned. Perhaps IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde can serve as mediator/therapist. But before everyone piles on, it may be worth reflecting that the Federal Reserve is not the only central bank with policy initiatives that may ripple across national borders.

Been There, Done That

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President Barack Obama has nominated Stanley Fischer to the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve Board, where he will succeed Janet Yellen as Vice-Chair of the Board. Fischer’s accomplishments are well-known. But he also brings an interesting set of credentials to the Board at a time when it has been criticized for ignoring the impact of its policies on other countries.

Fischer received his doctoral degree from MIT, and returned there after a stint on the faculty at the University of Chicago. During the 1970s and 1980s he taught or advised such future luminaries as Ben Bernanke, Greg Mankiw and Mario Draghi. He served as Vice President and Chief Economist of the World Bank from 1988 to 1990. He was the First Deputy Managing Director of the IMF from 1994 through 2001, a period when financial crises recurred on a regular basis in the emerging market countries.

Fischer’s experience with those crises gives him a perspective that macroeconomists who work only on the U.S. economy do not possess. Paul Krugman has written about how the financial instability of the post-Bretton Woods era has affected the views of those who follow these events. In 2009, for example, when our profession was castigated for not foreseeing the global financial crisis, Krugman wrote: “

…the common claim that economists ignored the financial side and the risks of crisis seems not quite fair – at least from where I sit. In international macro, one of my two home fields, we’ve worried about and tried to analyze crises a lot. Especially after the Asian crisis of 1997-98, financial crises were very much on everyone’s mind.

Similarly, in 2011 Krugman wrote:

Indeed, my sense is that international macroeconomists – people who followed the ERM crises of the early 1990s, the Latin American debt crisis, the Asian crisis of the late 90s, and so on – were caught much less flat-footed.

The IMF, of course, was widely criticized at the time for its crisis-management policies and its advocacy of deregulating capital flows.  In retrospect, Fischer’s arguments in favor of capital account liberalization appear overly zealous, and he has drawn criticisms for those positions. The IMF has recently adopted a more nuanced position on the use of capital controls as a macro prudential tool.

And yet—in 2000, after the resignation of the IMF’s Managing Director Michel Camdessus, Fischer, who was born in Rhodesia (now Zambia), was nominated to be Camdessus’ replacement by a group of African nations. (Miles Kahler presents the story in his Leadership Selection in the Major Multilaterals.) This was a challenge to the European governments that had always claimed the prerogative of naming the Managing Directors of the IMF since it commenced operations in 1945. But the nomination was also an indication of the respect that Fischer enjoyed amongst the African and other developing countries. In the end, it was impossible to change the IMF’s traditional governing procedures, and Horst Köhler of Germany became the new Managing Director.

After Fischer left the IMF, he went to work at Citigroup. In 2005 he was appointed Governor of the Bank of Israel, and served there until last year. Under his leadership the Bank received praise for its policies. Fischer was widely admired and received an “A” for his stewardship from the magazine Global Finance. Those pouring through his recent speeches and writings for indications of what he might do as a Federal Reserve Governor believe that he endorses the Fed’s accommodative stance, but may have a nuanced approach on the benefits and costs of forward guidance.

Stanley Fischer, therefore, brings several attributes to the Federal Reserve. First, he has an unquestioned command of macroeconomics, and in particular, monetary policy. Second, he has a wealth of experience in dealing with financial calamities. And third, he earned the trust and respect of policymakers in developing nations while he served at the IMF. Those qualities will be much appreciated as foreign officials and financial markets deal with the Federal Reserve’s policy pivot.