The Unassuming Economist

From a new VOX post:

“The role of exchange rate policies in economic development is still largely debated. This column argues that there are theoretical foundations for policies that guarantee competitive and stable real exchange rates. When there are constraints on the available set of policy instruments, the complementary use of competitive exchange rates with export taxes for traditional export sectors would result in effectively multiple real exchange rates. The empirical evidence suggests that both foreign exchange interventions and capital account regulations can be effectively used for maintaining competitive exchange rates and for dampening the effects of boom-bust cycles in external financing and the terms of trade on the exchange rate, thereby promoting growth and stability.”

“A variety of historical experiences support the claim that stable and competitive real exchange rate (SCRER) policies are good for economic development (Rodrik 2008, Razmi et al. 2012). We have argued that there are theoretical foundations for such an approach as an optimal policy strategy in the presence of certain constraints on the available set of policy instruments. The main argument against such interventions – that they represent interference in the free functioning of markets, which, in the absence of such intervention would ensure efficiency – misses two fundamental points:

1. every central bank intervention, including the setting of interest rates, affects the value of the exchange rate; this means, in fact, that there is no such thing as a ‘pure’ market exchange rate; and
2. all economies, and especially developing and emerging markets, are rife with market imperfections, including learning and macroeconomic externalities.

Our analysis of the empirical evidence on the effectiveness of different policy instruments suggests that both foreign exchange interventions and capital account regulations can be effectively used for maintaining competitive exchange rates and for dampening the effects of boom-bust cycles in external financing and the terms of trade on the exchange rate, thereby promoting growth and stability.”