Macroeconomic Policy: Demystifying Monetary and Fiscal Policy
In-person | 05 – 13 August 2023
The focus of this applied macroeconomic policy course will be on the analysis of fiscal and monetary policies. Both domestic as well as global macropolicies will be studied in the context of current real-world events. The course follows the historical development of macroeconomics from the Classical and the Keynesian models to the Supply-Sider paradigm, and finally into the post-Covid, and “Ukraine” era. The current state of the Singapore economy, along with the economies of its major trading partners responding to (hopefully) the end of the global pandemic and supply chain shocks stemming from it and the Ukraine invasion, will be analyzed. We will also look carefully at the massive hot capital inflows into Singapore from China and Hong Kong and their role in superheating Singapore’s economy.
This is a not-for-credit course. E-certificates of Completion will be issued to participants upon the satisfactory completion of the course.
By the end of this course, students will be able to have an understanding of the following topics:
A. The Role of Expectations in Macroeconomic Policy: A Brief Overview
B. National Income Accounting
- The sustainability of bond-financed deficits, especially after Covid-related spending and increases in defense, infrastructure and cuts in taxes.
- Examining the global capital inflows post Covid: Budget deficits, trade deficits, interest rates and exchange rates.
- Capital flows and current account balances between the US, China and the rest of the world. Can the US Safe Haven handle the pressure of the US Deficit Poison Pill, the slowdown in China, and the lingering trade war? Can Singapore retain its Safe Haven status?
- The reasons and consequences of managed exchange rates as executed by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) along with the monetary (exchange rate0 policies of Indonesia, Malaysia, Japan, and Vietnam: The $-Yuan saga, the gold standard, and the future of exchange rate pegs.
C. Unemployment and Inflation: Overheating, Hard and Soft Landings, and Speculative Asset Price (SAP) Bubbles. The global battle against resurgent inflation will be analyzed in detail.
D. Aggregate Supply and Demand Analysis
- The Classical and Keynesian models.
- Rational Expectations, Supply-Siders, global fiscal stimulus, and the shortage of path- breaking innovation.
E. Analyzing Monetary and Fiscal Policy
- The analysis of macroeconomic stabilization policies: Some painful policy lessons for the Treasury and the Federal Reserve, the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) and the European Central Bank (ECB).
- Zhu Rongji, Milton Friedman, “Modern Monetary Theory”, The Fed, Dr. Richard Hu and monetary policy.
F. Current Macroeconomic Issues
- Analyzing current monetary and fiscal macropolicies globally: How did Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) explain the absence of inflation during Covid, and is MMT dead now?
- The outlook for the global economy in 2022-23: Will the Biden Stimulus Plan avert global stagflation, or will major economies have to swing back to supply-side economics? What is the outlook for Singapore’s massive SAP bubble in its housing sector?
- The state of the European Economies and the Eurozone after Brexit.
- The future of innovation, technology and the ecosystem for the next big breakthrough.
- The yield curve (normal and inverted) and the signs for bond vigilantes in 2022-23.
- In addition to the economies listed above, the outlook for Australia, Canada, Japan, Malaysia, Switzerland and the UK.
About Dr. Farrokh Langdana
Prof Farrokh Langdana, Executive MBA Program Director
Dr. Langdana’s areas of specialization include monetary and fiscal policy implications and international trade and global macroeconomic policy. All his widely-read blogs and articles, including his Fireside Chats, pertaining to current global fiscal and monetary policy analyses, can be read by scrolling down or clicking here.
Prof. Langdana’s research deals with macroeconomic experimentation and the role of stabilization policy in an expectations-driven economy. He has published several articles as well as five books in this area. His new book, co-authored with Peter Murphy and published by Springer Press, is titled “International Trade and Global Macropolicy.”
Most recently, Prof. Langdana’s Macropolicy course and Prof. Ignacio (Nacho) Vijil-Cabrera’s course in Pricing Strategy (Managerial Econ) were both ranked #2 by Financial Times in Economics in EMBA programs worldwide, for the fourth time in succession, in 2020. Economics has been in the Top 10 in the FT global rankings, over 8 times. In 2021, Prof. Langdana was featured as the lead story in the article, “15 Executive MBA Professors who made a Difference in 2021” by Poets and Quants.
S$3,745 inclusive of GST, course materials and e-certificate.
Course Schedule
| Date | Time (SGT) | |
| Session 1 | Saturday, August 05, 2023 | 9am to 6.00pm |
| Session 2 | Sunday, August 06, 2023 | 9am to 6.00pm |
| Session 3 | Tuesday, August 08, 2023 | 7pm to 10pm |
| Session 4 | Thursday, August 10, 2023 | 7pm to 10pm |
| Session 5 | Saturday, August 12, 2023 | 9am to 6.00pm |
| Session 6 | Sunday, August 13, 2023 | 9am to 6.00pm |
