Comment

Not surprisingly, the COVID-19 epidemic is already playing into today’s nationalist narratives. In a world flooded with disinformation, COVID-19 promises to bring even more. A column by Harold James.

Trump calls on the Fed to lower interest rates and ease its monetary policy so that the dollar will depreciate: The US is free to manipulate its currency – just so long as no one else does. A column by Anne O. Krueger.

For the first time since coming to power, Xi’s high-tech censorship machine is meeting with intense resistance from millions of Chinese Internet users. A column by Xiao Qiang.

The world economy was weak, and getting weaker, when COVID-19 struck. The V-shaped recovery trajectory of a SARS-like episode will thus be much tougher to replicate. A column by Stephen S. Roach.

Bloomberg is untested, Sanders’s odds are lower than they would be in an economic downturn, and Trump can tout an historically low unemployment rate. A column by Michael J. Boskin.

Owing to modern science and technology, and our capacity for collective action, we already have the tools to prevent, manage, and contain global pandemics. A column by Julie Sunderland.

Sustained large-scale international aid programs are deeply unpopular. And given that domestic fiscal solidarity is already wanting, cross-border fiscal solidarity seems like a non-starter. A column by Willem H. Buiter.

It is because fiscal policy inevitably involves messy compromises – often overturned by future elections – that most countries have turned to central banks for short-term stabilization policy. A column by Kenneth Rogoff.

Brexit may have lifted the national mood for now. But sooner or later, hard economic realities will reassert themselves. A column by Harold James.

When China’s leaders finally declare victory against the current outbreak, they will credit the CPC’s leadership. But the truth is just the opposite: the party is again responsible for this calamity. A column by Minxin Pei.

The EU would be mistaken to exploit its economic advantage when the trade talks start. Brexit should lead to a productive special relationship in which the UK remains a close partner of the EU. A column by Daniel Gros.

Before the financial crisis, the ECB was concerned with monetary policy. Then it turned into a public bailout authority. Now, it is becoming an economic government that prints its budget. A column by Hans-Werner Sinn.