Social Europe

politics, economy and employment & labour

  • Themes
    • Strategic autonomy
    • War in Ukraine
    • European digital sphere
    • Recovery and resilience
  • Publications
    • Books
    • Dossiers
    • Occasional Papers
    • Research Essays
    • Brexit Paper Series
  • Podcast
  • Videos
  • Newsletter

The Future Of The Captured State

Simon Johnson 28th April 2014

Simon Johnson, captured state

Simon Johnson

Concerns about state capture are nothing new. Special interests hold undue sway over official decision-makers in many countries, and regulators are always prone to see the world through the eyes of the people whose activities they are supposed to oversee. But the rise of finance in industrialized countries has cast these issues in a new, much harsher light.

Before 1939, wages and profits in the financial sector in the United States amounted to less than 1% of GDP; now they stand at 7-8% of GDP. In recent decades, financial assets have expanded dramatically relative to any measure of economic activity, as life expectancy increased and the post-WWII baby boomers began to think about saving for retirement. Compared to the size of the US economy, individual banks are now much bigger than they were in the early 1990’s. (The precise numbers are different in other industrialized countries, but the rise of finance is a general phenomenon.)

The global financial crisis of 2007-2008 and the deep recession that resulted made it plain to see that the financial sector in the US and elsewhere had become too powerful. Since the 1980’s, a form of “cognitive capture” had occurred, with policymakers becoming convinced that innovation and deregulation could only improve the functioning of both financial intermediation and the broader economy. The crisis proved this view completely wrong, imposing massive costs – measured in terms of jobs lost, lives disrupted, and increased hardship – on millions of people.

Financial regulation entered a new, much more contested phase in 2010 – at least in the US. Most officials now concede the existence of systemic risk as a form of “pollution,” meaning that banks and other financial firms do not necessarily internalize the full costs of their structures and activities. And these costs can be huge – potentially large enough, despite recent reform attempts, to cause Great Depression II (or worse).

Operating big financial firms with small amounts of equity capital and a lot of debt may be in the interest of their managers, but it is definitely not in the interest of the rest of society. Moreover, providing large implicit subsidies to firms that are too big to fail should not be an attractive policy, because it encourages such firms to take on excessive risk (and to become even bigger).

And yet debate about these issues has remained wide open. The question is no longer so much one of beliefs. Now it is simply about money – particularly campaign contributions, but also the revolving door between Washington and Wall Street, as well as the vast pro-megabank interests that pour millions of dollars into think tanks and other, more shadowy organisations.

The Oscar-winning documentary Inside Job raised some sensitivities and led to increased disclosures by some people, including academics, concerning their involvement with the financial industry. But there remain profound monetary ties between big banks and people who purport to be independent analysts providing expert opinions. Some officials remain highly captured.

But there is also good news: Other officials are now much more resistant and inclined to push back against the industry. Well-informed nonpartisan outsiders are increasingly well organized and influential, particularly when they can work closely with pro-reform officials.

The latest indications from the Board of Governors of the US Federal Reserve – a crucial piece of this puzzle – are encouraging. For example, new rules for foreign banks operating in the US essentially require them to fund themselves with as much equity as US banks. But, on the eve of a new presidential campaign, the struggle over this important precinct of the American state remains far from over.<

With the exception of the United Kingdom, the extreme free-market view gained less traction in Europe in recent decades than it did in the US; nonetheless, the challenge of implementing financial reforms in the eurozone is actually more difficult. Governments regard domestic banks as important buyers of sovereign debt. The banks argue that more effective regulation would limit credit and slow the pace of economic recovery.

As a result, the authorities in Germany and France (as well as Japan) have consistently resisted increasing capital requirements, despite widespread agreement that doing so is an essential part of effective re-regulation. Their opposition has undermined international efforts to build a more resilient system – and it will likely hamper efforts to put the European economy on a sounder footing.

In other words, key European states remain just as captured by financial interests as the American state ever was. And the big American banks now want to use the slow pace of change in Europe as a brake on US policy (for example, through the ongoing free-trade negotiations between the European Union and the US). If the US is to escape the consequences of government capture by big Wall Street banks, it cannot wait for Europe to catch up on regulation, including capital requirements.

© Project Syndicate

Simon Johnson

Simon Johnson, a former chief economist of the IMF, is a professor at MIT Sloan, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, and co-founder of a leading economics blog, The Baseline Scenario.

You are here: Home / Politics / The Future Of The Captured State

Most Popular Posts

Visentini,ITUC,Qatar,Fight Impunity,50,000 Visentini, ‘Fight Impunity’, the ITUC and QatarFrank Hoffer
Russian soldiers' mothers,war,Ukraine The Ukraine war and Russian soldiers’ mothersJennifer Mathers and Natasha Danilova
IGU,documents,International Gas Union,lobby,lobbying,sustainable finance taxonomy,green gas,EU,COP ‘Gaslighting’ Europe on fossil fuelsFaye Holder
Schengen,Fortress Europe,Romania,Bulgaria Romania and Bulgaria stuck in EU’s second tierMagdalena Ulceluse
income inequality,inequality,Gini,1 per cent,elephant chart,elephant Global income inequality: time to revise the elephantBranko Milanovic

Most Recent Posts

transition,deindustrialisation,degradation,environment Europe’s industry and the ecological transitionCharlotte Bez and Lorenzo Feltrin
central and eastern Europe,unions,recognition Social dialogue in central and eastern EuropeMartin Myant
women soldiers,Ukraine Ukraine war: attitudes changing to women soldiersJennifer Mathers and Anna Kvit
military secrets,World Trade Organization,WTO,NATO,intellectual-property rights Military secrets and the World Trade OrganizationUgo Pagano
energy transition,Europe,wind and solar Europe’s energy transition starts to speed upDave Jones

Other Social Europe Publications

front cover scaled Towards a social-democratic century?
Cover e1655225066994 National recovery and resilience plans
Untitled design The transatlantic relationship
Women Corona e1631700896969 500 Women and the coronavirus crisis
sere12 1 RE No. 12: Why No Economic Democracy in Sweden?

ILO advertisement

Global Wage Report 2022-23: The impact of inflation and COVID-19 on wages and purchasing power

The International Labour Organization's Global Wage Report is a key reference on wages and wage inequality for the academic community and policy-makers around the world.

This eighth edition of the report, The Impact of inflation and COVID-19 on wages and purchasing power, examines the evolution of real wages, giving a unique picture of wage trends globally and by region. The report includes evidence on how wages have evolved through the COVID-19 crisis as well as how the current inflationary context is biting into real wage growth in most regions of the world. The report shows that for the first time in the 21st century real wage growth has fallen to negative values while, at the same time, the gap between real productivity growth and real wage growth continues to widen.

The report analysis the evolution of the real total wage bill from 2019 to 2022 to show how its different components—employment, nominal wages and inflation—have changed during the COVID-19 crisis and, more recently, during the cost-of-living crisis. The decomposition of the total wage bill, and its evolution, is shown for all wage employees and distinguishes between women and men. The report also looks at changes in wage inequality and the gender pay gap to reveal how COVID-19 may have contributed to increasing income inequality in different regions of the world. Together, the empirical evidence in the report becomes the backbone of a policy discussion that could play a key role in a human-centred recovery from the different ongoing crises.


DOWNLOAD HERE

ETUI advertisement

Social policy in the European Union: state of play 2022

Since 2000, the annual Bilan social volume has been analysing the state of play of social policy in the European Union during the preceding year, the better to forecast developments in the new one. Co-produced by the European Social Observatory (OSE) and the European Trade Union Institute (ETUI), the new edition is no exception. In the context of multiple crises, the authors find that social policies gained in ambition in 2022. At the same time, the new EU economic framework, expected for 2023, should be made compatible with achieving the EU’s social and ‘green’ objectives. Finally, they raise the question whether the EU Social Imbalances Procedure and Open Strategic Autonomy paradigm could provide windows of opportunity to sustain the EU’s social ambition in the long run.


DOWNLOAD HERE

Eurofound advertisement

Eurofound webinar: Making telework work for everyone

Since 2020 more European workers and managers have enjoyed greater flexibility and autonomy in work and are reporting their preference for hybrid working. Also driven by technological developments and structural changes in employment, organisations are now integrating telework more permanently into their workplace.

To reflect on these shifts, on 6 December Eurofound researchers Oscar Vargas and John Hurley explored the challenges and opportunities of the surge in telework, as well as the overall growth of telework and teleworkable jobs in the EU and what this means for workers, managers, companies and policymakers.


WATCH THE WEBINAR HERE

Foundation for European Progressive Studies Advertisement

Discover the new FEPS Progressive Yearbook and what 2023 has in store for us!

The Progressive Yearbook focuses on transversal European issues that have left a mark on 2022, delivering insightful future-oriented analysis for the new year. It counts on renowned authors' contributions, including academics, politicians and analysts. This fourth edition is published in a time of war and, therefore, it mostly looks at the conflict itself, the actors involved and the implications for Europe.


DOWNLOAD HERE

Hans Böckler Stiftung Advertisement

The macroeconomic effects of re-applying the EU fiscal rules

Against the background of the European Commission's reform plans for the Stability and Growth Pact (SGP), this policy brief uses the macroeconometric multi-country model NiGEM to simulate the macroeconomic implications of the most relevant reform options from 2024 onwards. Next to a return to the existing and unreformed rules, the most prominent options include an expenditure rule linked to a debt anchor.

Our results for the euro area and its four biggest economies—France, Italy, Germany and Spain—indicate that returning to the rules of the SGP would lead to severe cuts in public spending, particularly if the SGP rules were interpreted as in the past. A more flexible interpretation would only somewhat ease the fiscal-adjustment burden. An expenditure rule along the lines of the European Fiscal Board would, however, not necessarily alleviate that burden in and of itself.

Our simulations show great care must be taken to specify the expenditure rule, such that fiscal consolidation is achieved in a growth-friendly way. Raising the debt ceiling to 90 per cent of gross domestic product and applying less demanding fiscal adjustments, as proposed by the IMK, would go a long way.


DOWNLOAD HERE

About Social Europe

Our Mission

Article Submission

Membership

Advertisements

Legal Disclosure

Privacy Policy

Copyright

Social Europe ISSN 2628-7641

Social Europe Archives

Search Social Europe

Themes Archive

Politics Archive

Economy Archive

Society Archive

Ecology Archive

Follow us

RSS Feed

Follow us on Facebook

Follow us on Twitter

Follow us on LinkedIn

Follow us on YouTube