This is my private account. I am Professor of macroeconomics at TU Dortmund, but all views are private and do not represent the university.
Feb 16 • 10 tweets • 2 min read
Some, aided by some economists, have tricked themselves into believing that payment through more debt is a free lunch and resolution of the debt brake avoids all hard trade-offs afterwords. This is complete nonsense. All instruments, tax increase, lower spending, lower transfers
higher debt come with cost and tradeoffs: cost/teadeoffs involved are efficiency losses and who bears the burden. The cost are typically convex that is relying on one instrument alone is inefficient. The debt brake has taken debt financing from the table 2/n
Apr 22, 2022 • 10 tweets • 3 min read
Sehr geehrter Herr @GrosseEntrupVCI Selbstverständlich hat ihr Industrieverband die ganze Branche für Systemrelevant erklärt. Deswegen spricht der Kanzler heute im Interview von Millionen von Arbeitslosen, mehr als ihre Branche Beschäftigte hat.Ihr Beitrag dazu wird schwer zu 1/n
leugnen sein. Vom ersten Tag an hat Industrie/Gewerkschaften alles mobilisiert, um vor Deindustrialisierung des Landes zu warnen. Aufgerufen waren sie hingegen, Beitrag zu leisten, schon aus Eigeninteresse, wie man der Möglichkeit eines Gasstops begegnen kann bzw diesen zu 2/n
Mar 13, 2022 • 8 tweets • 2 min read
A nice balanced discussion, still some points unclear. German debate is framed in terms of absolute cost. Some say sanctions relativ to no sanctions are relatively mild, some say huge. But this is not economics. We have to think in relative alternative:1/n
Scenario 1) do nothing, some peace prayer, and then go back to business for 2-3 years importing Russian gas and let Russia threat maybe Poland or Baltic giving them time to readjust as well. that is position of union economists, companies etc and needs to be stated clearly 2/n
