As previously noted, the G-20 has done a much better job than I would have thought possible a year ago. It now looks like the Obama administration is close to earning consensus on a framework arrangement on macroeconomic policy coordination. The devil's in the implementation, of course, but the fact that they're close to consensus on such a framework is truly surprising.
Naturally, the French like to focus on peripheral issues that they are convinced contributed to last year's financial meltdown. Last April it was tax havens; this time France's pet peeve is placing a cap on bank bonuses (admittedly less peripheral than the tax havens).
It now looks like there will be agreement on that issue -- in part because the caps will not include specific monetary caps.
I raise all of this because Nicolas Sarkozy's "bonus tsar", Michel Camdessus, gave an interview to the Financial Times in which he was refreshingly candid about the issue:
France’s bonus tsar on Thursday said that traders’ bonuses were a largely symbolic issue for G20 leaders, and that in terms of money they were the “least important” item on the agenda.
Michel Camdessus, the former head of the International Monetary Fund, said: “If you look at this issue of remuneration in the global agenda of the G20, it is certainly – in terms of cash, money – the least important of all issues on the table.”
Mr Camdessus, charged by Nicolas Sarkozy, the French president, last month with monitoring bonuses of traders at state-aided banks, added: “But if you look at the symbolic value of the issue, it is one of the most important.”
Fine -- it's symbolically important. But if a symbolic agreement can allow the G-20 to keep their eyes on the macroeconomic prize, then three cheers for symbolic gestures.
Read More
(2)
HIDE COMMENTS LOGIN OR REGISTER REPORT ABUSE