Readings in British monetary economics

THE Money Study Group was formed over a year ago, with the dual objectives of bringing together people in the United Kingdom concerned with understanding of and research into the British monetary system, whether as academic scholars, bank economists, or officials of the Bank of England and the Treasury, and promoting research on the British monetary and financial system. The main activities of the Group thus far have been directly or indirectly concerned with the organization of conferences and seminars on British monetary problems the conferences being general assem blies of experts concerned with the field as a whole, and the seminars involving smaller groups of specialists in a particular problem area requiring special and more technical, theoretical, and empirical expertise. In all, three conferences were held during the Group's first two years of activity. The first of these, meeting Hove in November 1969, marked the lapse of ten years from the publication of the Radcliffe Report and the conference papers surveyed subsequent developments in the monetary field, both in institutions and policy and in empirical a and theoretical work. The second conference, held in Sheffield in September 1970, again centred on issues directly in the field of monetary economics whilst the third conference, organized in January this year and held in London, shifted the son to problems raised by the recent inflation. The Group's focus seminars have met more frequently, generally in London.
The present volume is an attempt to fill this gap, and to provide British students with a collection of readings that will at the same time instruct them on the general outlines of what is known and accepted and what is still controversial in monetary economics, system, with which they are familiar and with which in any case and place the issues in the context of the existing British monetary they will be concerned in their careers after graduation.