Here is the statement, obviously intending to put to rest the continuing dispute about the advantages of a welfare state versus Anglo-Saxon style capitalism:
"To enable market-oriented economies to operate as they should and can, we need to return to the right balance between markets and provision of public goods. That means moving away from both the Anglo-Saxon model of laissez-faire and voodoo economics and the continental European model of deficit-driven welfare states. Both are broken." [Emphasis mine]
However, I find the author's arguments in support of this point (or the lack of thereof) unconvincing.
The article also contains a useful list of the existing economic tools for fighting recessions/depressions:
"Until last year, policymakers could always produce a new rabbit from their hat to reflate asset prices and trigger economic recovery. Fiscal stimulus, near-zero interest rates, two rounds of “quantitative easing,” ring-fencing of bad debt, and trillions of dollars in bailouts and liquidity provision for banks and financial institutions: officials tried them all. Now they have run out of rabbits."
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