Incerteza, risco e actuação dos Bancos Centrais

"Uncertainty is a measure of our ignorance. Risk is what remains when we know everything at can be known."

Frase de Edmund Phelps, citada no Economist's View, numa referência a um artigo daquele no WSJ, Risk, Uncertainty, and Macroeconomic Policy, sobre a actuação do FED na actual conjuntura económica (ver aqui - ou a partir daí - outras abordagens sobre a mesma questão). O artigo é muito interessante.

O Economist's View explica o artigo: "Edmund Phelps says this distinction [a referida em primeiro lugar nesta nota] helps to explain why monetary policy rules and financial engineering based upon the neoclassical model, which relies upon the mistaken idea that we face known, quantifiable risks, are not holding up very well in the current environment where there is uncertainty about the nature of the risks that market participants face. Given this, what would he do different? Instead of lowering interest rates to combat unemployment, accept that the natural rate of unemployment has increased recently, and raise interest rates to prevent inflation"

PS(1): Paul Krugman questiona-se se o FED conseguirá, só por si, dar conta do recado. Ver em Betting the Bank - New York Times e conclui "I used to think that the major issues facing the next president would be how to get out of Iraq and what to do about health care. At this point, however, I suspect that the biggest problem for the next administration will be figuring out which parts of the financial system to bail out, how to pay the cleanup bills and how to explain what it’s doing to an angry public."

PS(2): Conjuntura hoje: A New Economic Order - washingtonpost.com