It's worth noting that Stiglitz is a Keynesian, and most Keynesians love Bernanke's plan for QE v. 2.0. So this is surprising commentary and puts him at odds with Krugman's calls for trillions in new Fed asset purchases.
From last week, did you see the following story from Ambrose Evans-Pritchard quoting a source who claims that $30 trillion of QE stimulus is needed.
Currency traders would flee the U.S. dollar and gold would super-spike. Even Bernanke is not that desperate, yet.
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Oct. 5 (Bloomberg) -- Joseph Stiglitz, Nobel Prize-winning economist, comments on the effectiveness of U.S. monetary policy, and its impact on global growth. He made the comments in a roundtable discussion at Columbia University in New York.
On the effectiveness of quantitative easing:
“There is lots of instability caused in part by the flood of liquidity from the Fed and the ECB. The irony is that the Fed is creating all this liquidity with the hope that it will revive the U.S. economy. It is doing nothing for the U.S. economy and causing chaos for the rest of the world.”
“In the U.S., and in some other countries, will the policy of quantitative easing suffice to solve the problems of inadequate global aggregate demand? The answer clearly is not. Lowering the interest rates may help a little bit, but it’s much too weak to address the problems facing the U.S. and Europe. So the answer is, and that is the point Soros made as well, we need fiscal stimulus.”
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(Reuters) - Ultra-loose monetary policies by the Federal Reserve and the European Central Bank are throwing the world into "chaos" rather than helping the global economic recovery, Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz said on Tuesday. A "flood of liquidity" from the Fed and the ECB is bringing instability to foreign-exchange markets, forcing countries such as Japan and Brazil to defend its exporters, Stiglitz told reporters in a conference at Columbia University. "The irony is that the Fed is creating all this liquidity with the hope that it will revive the American economy," Stiglitz said. "It's doing nothing for the American economy, but it's causing chaos over the rest of the world. It's a very strange policy that they are pursuing." The U.S. dollar has weakened about 6.5 percent against a basket of major currencies since the beginning of September as prospects for further monetary easing by the Fed have led investors to seek higher returns elsewhere. That flow of dollars caused currencies to appreciate in many emerging market countries such as Brazil, which offers strong growth prospects. The Japanese yen has also hit record highs against the dollar on expectation of additional greenback weakness. #