The ECB has announced a further expansionary shift by beefing up a range of existing policy instruments. Barring unexpected positive shocks this will not be enough to break out of a deflationary environment and convincingly underpin growth and a rapid reduction in unemployment. For that to happen fiscal policy must turn expansionary and/or the ECB must cast caution to the winds and adopt new tools. At the press conference following the policy announcement ECB President Draghi gave a tantalizing glimpse that new tools may indeed be on the way: we may yet see monetary financing of fiscal policy, or helicopter money as it is popularly known. [Read more…]