Martin Wolf examines how the norms of economics are being tested as policymakers seek solutions to slow growth.

Take the concept of paying interest, which goes back to the Babylonians. In the modern day, the business of banking has been based on paying savers and charging borrowers for money.

The notion of negative interest rates, paying banks for the privilege of holding funds, defies this established convention. Yet five central banks, which together oversee a quarter of the world’s economy, opted to impose negative rates on the commercial banks which use their services.

The aim of this unconventional policy is to convince people to spend and invest rather than save. The results so far have been mixed. This brings up the worrying possibility that central banks might be running out of options to boost economic growth nearly ten years after the start of the last financial crisis.

Martin Wolf, Chief Economic Commentator of the Financial Times, talks with central bankers, past and present, to assess these unconventional approaches. Ideas that were once thought implausible, like helicopter money and a cashless society, are now being considered openly.
How could these policies affect how people spend and save in the future and how low can interest rates go?

Presenter/Martin Wolf, Producer/Sandra Kanthal for the BBC

Thursday 21 July

9.00am-9.45am

BBC RADIO 4

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