Wednesday, May 23, 2012

Inflation differences and QE3


There is a marked difference between inflation in the G10 and the rest of the world. This has usually been the case with inflation in emerging markets generally running higher than in the G10. What is notable is that most of the quantitative easing has been in the G10, but inflation seems to be one of the chief exports of the developed world to the emerging markets. 

More importantly, there is a significant difference between the inflation rates in G10 countries which have engaged in QE versus those that did not. The highest inflation rates are in US, UK, and EU which have all been quantitative easers. Still the data suggests that there could be room for more quantitative easing for the simple fact that the inflation rates are close to 2% percent which is the rate chosen by many central bankers as the long-term inflation target. Inflation slightly higher than the 2% target may be viewed as a small price to pay relative to the cost of lower output growth. If these numbers come down, we can expect that there will be more quantitative easing.

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