Top Economists Ponder Post-Crisis Realities

Fresh policy approaches needed in a new era

Standard economic models provide inadequate guidance

Macroeconomic policy is at a critical juncture

In the Wake of the Crisis: Leading Economists Reassess Economic Policy is a compilation of papers presented at a groundbreaking IMF conference in March 2011. The conference—attended by prominent academics and policymakers—aimed to take stock of the policy questions posed by the crisis and promote discussion about new economic policy approaches for the post-crisis era.

Edited by IMF Chief Economist Olivier Blanchard, David Romer of the University of California at Berkeley, Michael Spence of Stanford University, and Joseph Stiglitz of Columbia University, the book captures the state of macroeconomic thinking at a transformational moment.

Traditional models fall short

The crisis and the weak recovery that has followed raise fundamental questions concerning macroeconomics and economic policy, the authors find.

For instance, to what extent are financial markets efficient and self-correcting? How crucial is low and stable inflation for growth and the real stability of the economy? How strong is the case for open capital markets? Too often, the standard models provided insufficient guidance on how to respond to the unprecedented...