Question 3: Which would be the maximal public debt you would be willing to tolerate if used effectively (as in your answers to 1 and 2 above) to support an economic recovery?
Answer:
120% of GDP (e.g. if fiscal support were doubled)
Confidence level:
Confident
Comment:
There needs to be room for further fiscal expansion if required, but a limit of 120% would help to ensure the possibility of an eventual return to normal levels (a return not to be hurried for the wrong reasons as it was after 2008).
Question 2: Which of the following would have the second greatest impact in mitigating the economic effects of the coronavirus economic crisis in the UK?
Answer:
Making unemployment benefits more generous, streamlined, or comprehensive
Confidence level:
Very confident
Comment:
This provides the key safety net when, or for whom, the other measures mentioned above fail.
Question 1: Which of the following would have the greatest impact in mitigating the economic effects of the coronavirus economic crisis?
Answer:
None of the above, other, or no opinion
Confidence level:
Very confident
Comment:
The policy measure announced by the UK government since this survey was put together - paying 80% of employees' wages up to the limit of £2500 per month - looks right to me. It could be subsumed under 'broad cash transfers' but it seems better to enter it as a separate item. It needs to be supplemented now by some comparable scheme to help the self-employed (whose activities have been so much encouraged - directly and indirectly - by government policies in the last decade in particular).
Question 4: Which of the following policies would be your second choice of policy to boost private sector productivity, in addition to or absent your first choice?
Answer:
None of the above, other, or no opinion
Confidence level:
Very confident
Comment:
There needs to be a gradual but sustained reversal of the benefits cuts and the excessive pressures on people to take poor-quality jobs that have been introduced in the last decade (without abandoning the basic idea of ‘universal’ benefits), combined with investments in human education, notably via FE colleges and apprenticeships, so that individuals can more easily choose to get some retraining before re-entering the labour market at a higher point (and with higher skills).
In the last two questions you are asked which government policies are best suited to help the UK emerge from its productivity growth slowdown. Question 3 asks for your most preferred policy option, while question 4 asks for your second choice. You may use the comment section to outline specific policy recommendations.
Question 3: Which of the following policies would best help improve private sector productivity?
Answer:
Aggregate demand management through fiscal and/or monetary policy
Confidence level:
Very confident
Comment:
There needs to be a gradual but sustained reversal of the public expenditure cuts involved in the decade of austerity – not just a large increase in NHS spending plus a few large infrastructural projects, but a reversal of the cuts in other areas such as education and, above all, local authority funding. This in turn will encourage a revival of private sector investment.
The CFM surveys informs the public about the views held by prominent economists based in Europe on important macroeconomic and public policy questions. Some surveys focus specifically on the UK economy (as the CFM is a UK research centre), but surveys can in principle focus on any macroeconomic question for any region. The surveys shed light on the extent to which there is agreement or disagreement among these experts. An important motivation for the survey is to give a more comprehensive overview of the beliefs held by economists and in particular to include the views of those economists whose opinions are not frequently heard in public debates.
Questions mainly focus on macroeconomic and public policy topics. Although there are some questions that focus specifically on the UK economy, the setup of the survey is much broader and considers questions related to other countries/regions and also considers questions not tied to a specific economy.
The surveys are done in collaboration with the Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR).
Covid-19: Economic Policy Response
Question 3: Which would be the maximal public debt you would be willing to tolerate if used effectively (as in your answers to 1 and 2 above) to support an economic recovery?
Question 2: Which of the following would have the second greatest impact in mitigating the economic effects of the coronavirus economic crisis in the UK?
Question 1: Which of the following would have the greatest impact in mitigating the economic effects of the coronavirus economic crisis?
The UK Productivity Puzzle
Question 4: Which of the following policies would be your second choice of policy to boost private sector productivity, in addition to or absent your first choice?
In the last two questions you are asked which government policies are best suited to help the UK emerge from its productivity growth slowdown. Question 3 asks for your most preferred policy option, while question 4 asks for your second choice. You may use the comment section to outline specific policy recommendations.
Question 3: Which of the following policies would best help improve private sector productivity?
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