What is to be done? To find an answer, listen to the markets. They are saying: borrow and spend, please. Yet those who profess faith in the magic of the markets are most determined to ignore the cry. The fiscal skies are falling, they insist.
HSBC forecasts that the economies of high-income countries will now grow by 1.3 per cent this year and 1.6 per cent in 2012. Bond markets are at least as pessimistic: US 10-year Treasuries yielded 1.98 per cent on Monday, their lowest for 60 years; German Bunds yielded 1.85 per cent; even the UK could borrow at 2.5 per cent. These yields are falling fast towards Japanese levels. Incredibly yields on index-linked bonds were close to zero in the US, 0.12 per cent in Germany and 0.27 per cent in the UK.
Are the markets mad? Yes, insist the wise folk: the biggest risk is not slump, as markets fear, but default. Yet if markets get the prices of such governments’ bonds so wrong, why should one ever take them seriously?