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Betting the Bank

ポール・クルーグマン（PAUL KRUGMAN）
Published: March 14, 2008

Four years ago, an academic economist named Ben Bernanke co-authored a technical paper that could have been titled “Things the Federal Reserve Might Try if It’s Desperate” although that may not have been obvious from its actual title, “Monetary Policy Alternatives at the Zero Bound: An Empirical Investigation.”

Today, the Fed is indeed desperate, and Mr. Bernanke, as its chairman, is putting some of the paper’s suggestions into effect. Unfortunately, however, the Bernanke Fed’s actions even though they’re unprecedented in their scope probably won’t be enough to halt the economy’s downward spiral.

今日、FRBは実際必死で、だから議長としてバーナンキは論文の内容を実行しようとしている。しかし、バーナンキのFRBの行動がたとえ前例のないものだとしても経済悪化の悪循環を止めるには十分ではない。

And if I’m right about that, there’s another implication: the ugly economics of the financial crisis will soon create some ugly politics, too.

金融危機という醜い経済がやがて醜い政治をも生み出す。

To understand what’s going on, you have to know a bit about how monetary policy usually operates.

起こりつつあることを理解するためには通貨政策のはたらきを少し知る必要がある。

The Fed’s economic power rests on the fact that it’s the only institution with the right to add to the “monetary base”: pieces of green paper bearing portraits of dead presidents, plus deposits that private banks hold at the Fed and can convert into green paper at will.

FRBの経済的な権力はドル札を刷る権限を源泉としている。

When the Fed is worried about the state of the economy, it basically responds by printing more of that green paper, and using it to buy bonds from banks. The banks then use the green paper to make more loans, which causes businesses and households to spend more, and the economy expands.

経済が悪くなったらドル札を刷り、銀行からの国債を買い上げる。銀行はそれを貸し出して、事業や家計は消費が活発になり、経済は拡大する。

This process can be almost magical in its effects: a committee in Washington gives some technical instructions to a trading desk in New York, and just like that, the economy creates millions of jobs.

いつもはうまく行く。

But sometimes the magic doesn’t work. And this is one of those times.

今回はうまく行かなかった。

These days, it’s rare to get through a week without hearing about another financial disaster. Some of this is unavoidable: there’s nothing Mr. Bernanke can or should do to prevent people who bet on ever-rising house prices from losing money. But the Fed is trying to contain the damage from the collapse of the housing bubble, keeping it from causing a deep recession or wrecking financial markets that had nothing to do with housing.

金融危機を耳にしない日はない。FRBは、金融市場がだめになるのを回避したり、景気がひどく後退するのを回避したりして、住宅バブルの崩壊のダメージを封じ込めようとする。もっとも、それらは住宅とは関係がないのだが。

So Mr. Bernanke and his colleagues have been doing the usual thing: printing up green paper and using it to buy bonds. Unfortunately, the policy isn’t having much effect on the things that matter. Interest rates on government bonds are down but financial chaos has made banks unwilling to take risks, and it’s getting harder, not easier, for businesses to borrow money.

バーナンキたちがやっているのは、ドル札を刷っては、国債を買い上げるという通常の業務だ。残念ながら、効果はあまりない。金利は下がったが、銀行はリスクを冒さないし、事業家が金を借りるには状況は厳しい。

As a result, the Fed’s attempt to avert a recession has almost certainly failed. And each new piece of economic data like the news that retail sales fell last month adds to fears that the recession will be both deep and long.

結果としてFRBは景気後退を回避できず、小売売上高が落ちたとか、経済データが示すには、景気後退が深く長くなるかも知れない。

So now the Fed is following one of the options suggested in that 2004 paper, which was about things to do when conventional monetary policy isn’t getting any traction. Instead of following its usual practice of buying only safe U.S. government debt, the Fed announced this week that it would put $400 billion almost half its available funds into other stuff, including bonds backed by, yes, home mortgages. The hope is that this will stabilize markets and end the panic.

FRBは、安全な国債を買い上げる従来のやり方ではなくて、４０兆円の資金を住宅債務などに突っ込むことを今週宣言した。

Officially, the Fed won’t be buying mortgage-backed securities outright: it’s only accepting them as collateral in return for loans. But it’s definitely taking on some mortgage risk. Is this, to some extent, a bailout for banks? Yes.

公式には証券を買うなんて言ってないが…。

Still, that’s not what has me worried. I’m more concerned that despite the extraordinary scale of Mr. Bernanke’s action to my knowledge, no advanced-country’s central bank has ever exposed itself to this much market risk the Fed still won’t manage to get a grip on the economy. You see, $400 billion sounds like a lot, but it’s still small compared with the problem.

しかし、私はバーナンキの常軌を逸した介入規模を憂慮している。私の知る限り、先進国の中央銀行がそのようなリスクを冒した経験がない上に、４０兆円というと大きそうに見えるが、問題全体を救うにはまだ小さいことだ。

Indeed, early returns from the credit markets have been disappointing. Indicators of financial stress like the “TED spread” (don’t ask) are a little better than they were before the Fed’s announcement but not much, and things have by no means returned to normal.

実際、信用市場からの反応はがっかりするものだった。

What if this initiative fails? I’m sure that Mr. Bernanke and his colleagues are frantically considering other actions that they can take, but there’s only so much the Fed whose resources are limited, and whose mandate doesn’t extend to rescuing the whole financial system can do when faced with what looks increasingly like one of history’s great financial crises.

バーナンキたちは死に物狂いで次の手を打つ考えだ。

The next steps will be up to the politicians.

しかし、次の手は政治家による経済政策だ。

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.

次期大統領が直面する最大の問題はどうやってイラクから手を引くか、医療問題（健康保険）をどうするかだ。 しかしながら、いまこの時点での最大の仕事は、金融システムのどの部分を救済するか、どうやって借金を支払うか、怒れる公衆に対して政府が行おうとすることを如何に説明するかを把握することだ。