I have some objections about Germany here. A distinctive feature of Germany’s recession experience was that unemployment hardly increased. Also competition-weighted unit labor cost in Germany have been very low even before the recession started and many economists attribute the small increase in unemployment to this factor. In general, wage flexibility per se is a necessary but not a sufficient condition for recovery, labor market flexibility is key.
Question 2: Do you agree that the different behaviour of UK real wages relative to Eurozone wages during the Great Recession is in large part due to the UK having different labour market policies?
The UK labor market institutions are pretty flexible and this might have helped the recovery. I would attribute more to institutions and less to policies though.
Question 2: Do you agree that quantitative well-being analysis should play an important role in guiding policy makers in determining macroeconomic policies?
Question 3: More generally, do you agree that it is desirable to maintain central bank independence? Again focus on the near future, say next 48 months.
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).
Wages and economic recoveries
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Question 1: Do you agree that lower real wage growth was beneficial for employment levels during the Great Recession?
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Question 2: Do you agree that the different behaviour of UK real wages relative to Eurozone wages during the Great Recession is in large part due to the UK having different labour market policies?
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Happiness and well-being as objectives of macro policy
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Question 2: Do you agree that quantitative well-being analysis should play an important role in guiding policy makers in determining macroeconomic policies?
A “new” UK industrial strategy ?
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Question 2: Do you agree that the UK needs a new regional policy?
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The Future of Central Bank Independence
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Question 3: More generally, do you agree that it is desirable to maintain central bank independence? Again focus on the near future, say next 48 months.
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