Economic growth, inflation, and interest rates have declined in Asia, just as they have in the United States and Europe. Sustaining Economic Growth in Asia explores the relevance to several Asian economies of the diagnosis known as “secular stagnation.” Leading experts on the region discuss the fiscal and monetary policy challenges of reviving growth without generating domestic financial imbalances. The essays on innovation, demographics, spillovers, and various policy proposals are accompanied by case studies focusing on Japan, South Korea, China, India, and Indonesia.
Empires, city states, and nations have long pursued aggressive trade, tax, and investment policies to amass wealth. A new consensus emerged after the Great Depression and World War II supporting liberalized international trade, economic cooperation, and free markets. Today that consensus has shattered, replaced by a “new economic nationalism” of industrial policy, tariffs, and various methods of state support for the economy. Can this new approach deliver stability, national security, and prosperity? This book examines case studies revealing a decidedly mixed record. In some instances, economic nationalist policies have fostered growth and declining unemployment, though accompanied by fiscal costs and inefficiency. In much of the developing world, however, economic nationalist policies have produced corruption, debt burdens, inflation, and ultimately stagnation. By examining the past, The New Economic Nationalism provides a roadmap to an uncertain future.