How best to stimulate economy? Here’s Dr Rajan’s prescription - The T... https://epaper.timesgroup.com/Olive/ODN/TimesOfIndia/PrintArticle.as...

How best to stimulate economy? Here’s Dr

Rajan’s prescription
The coronavirus crisis has crippled the economy and there’s little choice for the government but to provide
a bigger stimulus to revive demand. Many have argued that while India’s lockdown has been the harshest,
its stimulus package is one of the smallest — so far. To fund a bigger public spending programme, the
government can either ask the RBI to print more money (monetise the deficit) or it can issue new bonds to
be subscribed by the banks (raise money through borrowing). In a LinkedIn post, former RBI governor
Raghuram Rajan explained how the two paths work and why ‘monetisation’ is a good option in the
short-term and withing reasonable limits

SO, IS THIS A FREE LUNCH FOR THE GOVT?

“Direct RBI financing is sometimes loosely termed money printing and thought to be free”, but Rajan says
this is “misleading”. The reason is because the government finances itself from RBI while RBI finances
itself from the banks at the reverse repo rate of 3.75%.

This represents a loss to the government in two ways: first, a reduction in the annual dividend RBI pays
the government. Second, banks get 3.75% instead of the 6% they could get by buying government bonds
directly. And since the government owns 70% of the banking sector, its dividends from public sector banks
also fall commensurately.

WILL IT FUEL INFLATION?

Such direct financing is “not inflationary per se” as long as banks are reluctant to lend further to business
or consumers. However, Rajan points out that as normal times return, RBI will have to pay a higher rate on
excess reserves, or sell its government bond holdings and extinguish excess reserves, else it will risk
excessive credit expansion and inflation.

Rajan says that if the fiscal deficit and the growth in government debt is deemed unsustainable, “investors
and rating agencies will take fright”. He thus calls for measures that ensure “we will go back to fiscal
health over the medium term”.

1 of 2 09-05-2020, 08:12
How best to stimulate economy? Here’s Dr Rajan’s prescription - The T... https://epaper.timesgroup.com/Olive/ODN/TimesOfIndia/PrintArticle.as...

credit

to The government should be concerned about protecting the health

of the economy and should spend what is needed. Obviously, it
should try and cut back unneeded spending, and prioritise. It should
also worry about getting the fiscal deficit and its debt back in shape
over the medium term… However, its inability to finance itself or fears of monetisation should not be a
constraint. Monetisation will neither be a game-changer nor a catastrophe, if done in a measured way

2 of 2 09-05-2020, 08:12