HK: . . . Hence I am still interested in what you and other signers would have written differently - not in terms of another wording of the statement, but of an another analytical view of U.S. economic reality and U.S. economic policy. By the way - early in November there will be a repeat of last years' "Third way" meeting featuring Clinton, Blair etc. One cannot rule out the possibility that Clinton will advocate "positive features of U.S. policy." >>>> For a moment I'll venture to speak for EPI, and not just myself. For us the crux of the matter is a failure to focus like a laser beam on the Bundesbank and the German role in upholding restrictive monetary and fiscal policy in the EU. Some do this from a Blairite/Clintonoid perspective with babble about the Third Way, while some lefts lurch in the opposite direction for different reasons. Speaking for myself again, one left posture is to damn European unification in principle. But without the EU/ECB/EMU, the German influence on European employment via the Bundesbank is manifest. So an anti-EU posture deals the left out of the fundamental issue of employment. By contrast, the project of democratizing the EU/ECB/EMU through EU-wide organizing for full employment makes more sense to me and is consistent with the basic Keynesian focus of the statement. There has been no deliberate Keynesian policy in the U.S. since the 1970's. So as far as deficit spending goes, there is NOTHING positive in the U.S. sphere. The monetary situation is different. Here there is the irony that the Fed and Greenspan project an image of toughness but, compared to Europe, have been relatively easy in their policy. I've said I don't think this was prompted by concerns for employment. Greenspan is on record requesting that the Fed charter be amended to restrict the Fed's mission to price stability. Instead, I speculate that Fed policy has been easy (relatively!) out of fear of a bursting bubble and hordes of angry mutual fund investors. Max Sawicky Economic Policy Institute
