Did the meeting of the Group of 20 in London last week put the world economy on the path of sustainable recovery? The answer is “no”. Such meetings cannot resolve fundamental disagreements over what has gone wrong and how to put it right. As a result, the world is on a path towards an unsustainable recovery, as I argued last week. An unsustainable recovery might be better than none, but it is not good enough.
This summit had two achievements: one broad and one specific.
First, “to jaw-jaw is better than war-war”, as Winston Churchill remarked. Given the intensity of the anger and fear loose upon the world, discussion itself must be good.