It may seem strange, at a time when Germany has notched up its fastest quarterly growth since unification – about 9 per cent at an annual rate – to worry about growth. But, apart from Germany and one or two other developed economies, growth concerns abound. Both the Bank of England and US Federal Reserve warned recently that growth in their countries is likely to disappoint, while Japan's government said this week that the country's growth rate collapsed in the second quarter.
A good way to interpret these slowing growth rates in the developed world is through a choice of metaphor; what my philosophy tutor many years ago called a thought experiment; and by considering what the Federal Reserve did not do last week.
Take the metaphor first. If you diagnosed the horrific financial crisis at the end of 2008 and early 2009 as a temporary depression, the prescription was clear: vast amounts of antidepressants in the form of the biggest fiscal and monetary stimulus the world has seen. Eventually the patient would feel cheerier and the world a brighter place. In time, it could be weaned off the medicine.