The Global Capital Market: Benefactor or Menace? / Maurice Obstfeld.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Obstfeld, Maurice.

Contributor:

National Bureau of Economic Research.

Series:

Working Paper Series (National Bureau of Economic Research) no. w6559.

NBER working paper series no. w6559

Language:

English

Physical Description:

1 online resource: illustrations (black and white);

Other Title:

The Global Capital Market

Place of Publication:

Cambridge, Mass. National Bureau of Economic Research 1998.

Summary:

This paper reviews the theoretical functions, history, and policy problems raised by the international capital market. The goal is to offer a perspective on both the considerable advantages the market offers and on the genuine hazards it poses, as well as on the avenues through which it constrains national policy choices. A duality of benefits and risks is inescapable in the real world of asymmetric information and imperfect contract enforcement. I argue, however, that in confronting the global capital market there is no reason to depart from conventional economic wisdom. The way to maximize net benefits is to encourage economic integration while attacking concomitant distortions and other unwanted side-effects at, or close to, their sources.

Notes:

Print version record

May 1998.