Do Central Banks Serve the People?

Dietsch, Peter, Claveau, François and Clément Fontan (2018), Do Central Banks Serve the People? Cambridge, UK, Polity Press, 140 p.

In the wake of the 2007 financial crisis, central banks injected trillions of dollars of liquidity – through quantitative easing – to prevent financial meltdown and stimulate the economy. The untold story behind these measures is that they have come at a considerable cost.

Central bankers argue we had no choice. Using examples from Europe and the US, this book shows why this claim is false. It outlines why we should worry about the role played by central banks since the crisis and what could be done about it. Not only docentral bank policies drive economic inequality, they have also become worryinglydependent on financial markets. Far from applying neutral and scientific solutions, theirexpertise is often biased in predictable ways.

This book is a sobering and urgent wake-up call for policy makers and anyone interested in how our monetary and financial system really works.

This content has been updated on July 15th, 2018 at 15 h 57 min.