Institutional methods of economic policy. §4

2. Instruments of state economic policy

The tools of the state's economic policy are chosen depending on its goals. The macroeconomic goals of modern states are multifaceted, and therefore the impact of the state on the economy is carried out using different tools. Moreover, such influence of the state can be both direct and indirect. Direct impact involves the participation of the state in the production process, and indirect - involves the use of the financial system. Thus, the key instruments of the state economic policy are fiscal and monetary policy.

In fiscal policy, the main instrument of state influence on the economy is the state budget. Its effectiveness in this vein is based on categories such as income and receipts. Let us consider in more detail the structure of the budget as an instrument of state management of the economy. The budget includes:

1) taxes, excises, customs duties, etc. (as a rule, this category is about 80–85% of all budget revenues);

2) income from state property (the share is usually 7-10%);

3) increase in receipts from social insurance and pension funds (or the creation of public debt - about 7%);

4) other income.

Budget expenditures include:

1) transfers (payments for health care, education, etc.) and subsidies. And, as a rule, this category makes up about 50% of all expenses;

2) development of market conditions and stimulation of economic growth. This item of expenditure is about 12% and includes investments in the agricultural sector and targeted programs, subsidies to enterprises, etc.;

4) other expenses.

So, from the considered structure, it can be seen that the state budget, as an instrument for regulating the economy, can participate in managing the socio-economic processes of redistribution and centralization of financial resources, stimulating production and controlling the financial condition of the state.

In general, the fiscal instruments of the state's economic policy help to ensure full employment and the production of non-inflationary GDP. This is done through changes in government spending and taxes.

Taxation, being an instrument of the fiscal policy of the state, affects both the recipient of funds - the state, and citizens, enterprises and institutions of the country, i.e. taxpayers. Therefore, the effect of taxation in the system of state regulation is based on the following principles.

1. Benefits principle. Economic agents, such as entrepreneurs, can purchase goods and services provided to them by the state, just like other goods. That is, when an entrepreneur receives income from goods or services provided by the state, he is obliged to pay taxes to finance the production of these goods and services.

Such goods or services can be raw materials owned by the state, energy, etc. In addition, we can talk about legal services or law enforcement services, because, using them, economic agents must support their maintenance by paying taxes.

2. The principle of solvency. Taxes should be levied on those who have a certain income and wealth at their disposal. In addition, citizens or entrepreneurs with high incomes must pay higher taxes than economic agents with lower wealth. Thus, the burden of taxes is distributed. This is necessary, since for citizens with low incomes, each ruble is more expensive than for wealthier ones, that is, with the help of this principle, a certain moral and ethical balance is observed in taxation and partly in the redistribution of income.

So, using the considered tools, fiscal policy can be stimulating, when an increase in government spending and tax cuts helps to overcome the cyclical downturn in the economy, or restrictive, if government spending cuts and tax increases determine the reduction of the cyclical recovery.

The action of monetary policy instruments helps to regulate the aggregate volume of production, employment and the price level by changing the money supply. Here The main tools of the Central Bank in regulating the money supply are:

1) refinancing rate- this is the discount rate of interest, at an increase in which the volume of loans from the Central Bank decreases, the operations of other (commercial) banks decrease, they receive a loan more expensively and because of this increase their own lending rates. Thus, the total money supply in the country's economy is reduced;

2) reserve requirement. The state of the economy is regulated by changing it;

3) open market operations. The purchase and sale of government securities by the Central Bank also determines the change in the money supply in the country. For example, if the Central Bank buys securities from a commercial bank, the amount in its reserve account will increase, and then the money supply expansion multiplier will come into play. It is important to remember here that the amount of expansion of the money supply depends on how its growth is distributed among deposits and cash. Accordingly, when the Central Bank sells securities, the reverse process will occur.

Thus, with the help of these instruments of monetary policy, the state can control the flow of money supply, regulate inflation and manage demand.

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The set of tools used in economic policy is almost identical in modern market economies. But the specific set of these instruments differs across countries, even if they have identical goals and accomplish similar tasks.

The problem of choosing economic policy instruments is much more complicated than it might seem at first glance. This is due not only to the aforementioned compatibility and incompatibility of many targets and instruments, but also to the fact that some instruments can act on several targets at the same time, often in the opposite direction. Thus, the strengthening of the ruble helps to reduce inflation in our country and make imports more accessible (with an expensive ruble, foreign goods in Russia become cheaper), improve the position of Russian exporters of capital (they can buy more foreign assets for the same amount of rubles), but at the same time lead to a deterioration in the situation Russian manufacturers (the prices for their goods on the Russian market become less competitive compared to the prices of foreign goods sold here) and Russian exporters of goods (their products on foreign markets become more expensive when converted into foreign currency). In addition, the influence of some instruments may turn out to be unpredictable, and (or) it may manifest itself later (delayed effect), as happened, for example, in Russia after the reduction of the main rate of the unified social tax (going mainly to the Pension Fund of Russia) from 30 % of the payroll fund (i.e., of the total amount of expenses of a firm or organization for the remuneration of its employees) to 26% in 2006, as a result of which the deficit began to grow rapidly in the Pension Fund (it is covered from the federal budget) and this the tax has been renamed to insurance premiums, with the base rate increasing again to 30% from 2011. Finally, some instruments may dampen (or neutralize) the impact of other instruments. An example is the state corporations created in Russia in the past decade, with their often monopoly position in a particular industry and area, and at the same time, the antimonopoly policy that is being increasingly pursued in Russia.

In a market economy, the tools of monetary and fiscal policy are most actively used, primarily to ensure economic stability, especially to smooth out cyclical fluctuations.

The object of regulation of monetary policy is the money market and, mainly, the money supply and the interest rate. Monetary policy is most often carried out by the country's central bank, usually together with the ministry of finance (Table 4.2).

Table 4.2

Monetary policy of the Bank of Russia

Policy type	Restrictive monetary policy ("dear money" policy)	Expansionary monetary policy ("cheap money" policy)
	Reducing the money supply to fight inflation	Increasing the Money Supply to Stimulate Economic Growth and Reduce Unemployment
Tools	Buying foreign currency Purchase of government securities	Sale of foreign currency Sale of government securities
Tools	Increasing the required reserve ratio for banks Increasing the interest rate on commercial bank deposits Increasing the refinancing rate Increasing government account balances with the Central Bank Sale by the central bank of its bonds to commercial banks Reverse repurchase transactions*	Reducing the required reserve ratio for banks Reducing the interest rate on deposits of commercial banks with the Central Bank of the Russian Federation Decrease in the refinancing rate Decrease in balances on government accounts with the Central Bank Redemption of the Central Bank of the Russian Federation of its bonds from commercial banks Direct REPO operations*

* REPO repurchase agreement ) - transactions for the sale of securities with the obligation to repurchase them after a certain period but at a predetermined price (direct REPO) and transactions for the purchase of securities with the obligation to resell at a predetermined price (reverse REPO).

The main instruments of fiscal policy include budgetary expenditures (for example, government purchases and social transfers) and budgetary revenues (primarily taxes). According to the way they influence the economy, fiscal policy instruments can be divided into discretionary policy instruments (for example, legislative changes in the amount of government purchases, tax rates and transfers) and automatic (built-in) stabilizers (see above). The latter are instruments whose value remains unchanged, but the very presence of which (embedded in the economic system) automatically stabilizes the economy, stimulating business activity during a recession and restraining it during "overheating". Automatic stabilizers primarily include income taxes (especially progressive ones), indirect taxes (primarily value added tax), unemployment benefits, and poverty benefits.

Built-in stabilizers do not eliminate the causes of cyclical fluctuations, but limit their scope. Therefore, built-in stabilizers, as a rule, are combined with discretionary fiscal policy instruments aimed at ensuring full employment of resources. One of the features of built-in stabilizers is that they turn on (and turn off) automatically, i.e. they are characterized by the absence of a lag in time, but their effect is short-term. As for the effect of discretionary policy instruments, it is longer in time, but at the same time it is characterized by the presence of a lag due to the need to make a legislative decision to change fiscal policy.

We repeat that the state, as a rule, uses a set of different tools (a package of measures), which is most effective in the conditions of a particular country, but may not work at all or work worse in the conditions of another country. In addition, in economic policy there is a constant danger of the state reacting slowly to changing economic conditions that require a different set of instruments, but this happens with a delay due to the lag between the adoption of a political decision to change the policy and its implementation.

1) taxes, excises, customs duties, etc. (as a rule, this category is about 80–85% of all budget revenues);

2) income from state property (the share is usually 7-10%);

3) increase in receipts from social insurance and pension funds (or the creation of public debt - about 7%);

4) other income.

Budget expenditures include:

1) transfers (payments for health care, education, etc.) and subsidies. And, as a rule, this category makes up about 50% of all expenses;

4) other expenses.

2) reserve requirement. The state of the economy is regulated by changing it;

Thus, with the help of these instruments of monetary policy, the state can control the flow of money supply, regulate inflation and manage demand.

Economic regulation system

The implementation of economic policy is possible only with the use of a set of measures, tools that form the mechanism of state influence on the economy. Knowledge of the structure of these measures is required to be able to use them rationally. Depending on the selected criteria, there are several options for their classification. In particular, according to the method of functioning, methods of direct and indirect influence on the economy are distinguished.

Methods of direct influence imply such regulation by the state, in which the subjects of the economy are forced to come to decisions based not on independent economic choice, but on the instructions of the state.

As an example, let's name the tax legislation, legal rules in the field of depreciation, budgetary procedures for public investment. Direct methods often have a high degree of effect due to the rapid achievement of economic results. However, they have a serious drawback - the creation of obstacles to the market process.

Methods of indirect influence are manifested in the fact that the state does not directly influence the decisions made by the subjects of the economy. It only creates the preconditions for subjects to gravitate toward those options that correspond to the goals of economic policy when they make their own choice of economic decisions.

The advantages of these methods of influencing the economy are that they do not disrupt the market situation, do not introduce an unexpected imbalance into a state of dynamic equilibrium. The disadvantage is a certain time lag observed between the adoption of measures by the state, their perception by the economy and the resulting changes in economic results.

Let us now turn to another, very important classification of the considered methods. The approach criterion is organizational and institutional. This list includes: administrative, economic, institutional methods (Fig. 18.5).

Administrative measures

The set of administrative levers covers those regulatory actions that are related to the provision of legal infrastructure. The aim of the measures taken is to create the most reasonable legal framework conditions for the private sector. Their function is to provide a stable legal environment for business life, protection of the competitive environment, preservation of property rights and opportunities for free economic decision-making.

Rice. 18.5. System of economic policy instruments

Administrative measures, in turn, are divided into measures of prohibition, permission, coercion.

The degree of activity in the application of administrative measures may vary depending on the area of the economy. They are now manifesting themselves most persistently in the field of environmental protection, as well as in the field of social protection of the poorly provided sections of the population.

In the Russian economy, there are two trends in relation to administrative methods:

As a result of the aggravated political confrontation between power structures, the effectiveness of administrative measures has significantly decreased;

The legacy of the era of the command economy led to a well-known setback in relation to administrative levers. The turn of the economy towards a market system gave rise to a natural desire to renounce them. As a result of the pendulum effect, the withdrawal turned out to be excessively strong.

Economic measures

Economic instruments include those actions of the state that are not so much prescriptive as influencing certain aspects of the market process. We can talk about methods of influencing aggregate demand, aggregate supply, the degree of centralization of capital, social and structural aspects of the economy. Economic measures include:

Financial (budgetary, fiscal) policy;

Monetary (monetary) policy;

Programming;

Forecasting.

The concept of "financial policy" is a capacious category. It reflects two approaches. On the one hand, it is a mechanism for implementing the goals of economic policy. On the other hand, the implementation of financial measures is one of the constituent elements of the general economic policy as such.

The category "monetary policy" has a similar multifaceted character. Compared to financial measures, monetary measures are more of an indirect impact. This is due, for example, to the fact that the financial policy is carried out primarily by the Ministry of Finance - an integral part of the government. Monetary policy is implemented by the Central Bank, which, as a rule, has relative independence from the legislative and executive authorities.

In the conditions of the current market economy, it is customary, as a rule, to first consider the possibility of monetary measures, and then - financial ones. This is due to the fact that the use of monetary policy to a greater extent reflects the typical ratio of the market and state principles in the economy. A mature national economy mainly involves the indirect impact of the state on economic entities. This preserves the freedom to make private economic decisions.

In the conditions of a transforming economy (or in the event of a crisis), the ratio of methods may be different. The financial (ie direct) aspect of regulation is sometimes brought to the fore.

Drawing up programs and forecasts mainly reflects the indirect version of state regulation. The programs are advisory in nature for the private sector. This process is focused mainly on providing the business community with important economic information. In both cases (when drawing up programs - in a more active form), the state can indirectly suggest and encourage entrepreneurs to take action. However, businessmen make their own decisions about them.

Institutional Measures

Describing the methods of state influence, one can also emphasize their organizational and institutional form.

The concept of "institutional" is relatively little used in domestic scientific circulation. It is perceived even weaker, unfortunately, by the economic thinking of the population. Meanwhile, the development of the economy in the market-legal version puts forward the need for a much more active use of this term. It reflects the fact that the phenomena of economic life in a developed legal state lose their random character. A network of certain legal, ethical, psychological, organizational norms and customs is, as it were, superimposed on the surface of economic reality. Economic policy itself is a system of organizationally formalized actions and traditions.

Such actions, associated with a relatively long-lived phenomenon, create the concept of "institution". According to W. Hamilton, institutions are a verbal symbol for the best description of a group of social customs. They signify the prevailing and permanent way of thinking or acting which has become the habit of some social group or the custom of a people. As an example, let's name: "institute of law", "institute of property".

Among the options for the distribution of institutional forms in modern conditions, we note:

Formation of executive structures of state power, the immediate task of which is the practical implementation of the goals of the government;

Creation and maintenance of state property objects, i.e. public sector;

Preparation of economic programs and economic forecasts;

Support for economic research centers (having different forms of ownership), economic information institutes, chambers of commerce and industry, various economic councils and unions;

Ensuring the functioning of institutions of advisers, consultants, expert councils on economic problems;

Legal, informational support for business and trade unions, rational forms of their interaction;

Participation in the creation of forms of economic integration, organization of regular international meetings on economic issues (for example, representatives of the G7 group).

The institutional aspect of state regulation in Russia has always manifested itself with certain specifics. It was implemented in domestic practice mainly in the form of creating a large number of institutions themselves and, to a lesser extent, legal institutions. Suffice it to recall that in the conditions of the USSR there were about 900 ministries, departments, and departments. In the present period, changes are taking place in the former accents of the institutional approach.

Financial mechanism of economic policy

Finance is one of the most complex categories in economics. In general, this is a set of cost flows associated with the distribution and use of monetary resources. In the traditional course of domestic economic science, it was customary to understand “finance” as a system of production relations, rather than the movement of funds itself.

The process of functioning of the financial system to fulfill certain goals at the state level is a financial policy. This concept is multifaceted. The regulation of macroeconomic equilibrium, the achievement of stabilization with the help of revenues and expenditures is commonly called "fiscal policy". Using financial resources, the state also participates in solving other problems, for example, social distribution. The full range of all tasks carried out through public finance forms the category of "financial policy" (one of the elements of which is thus fiscal policy).

What are government spending? Under this term, it is customary to understand the costs of the state for the acquisition of material goods and services related to the satisfaction of public needs. The main objective of spending policy is to influence aggregate demand. This effect is quite direct.

In economic theory, the question is posed: for the production and supply of what goods should the state spend money? Before answering, we should once again emphasize the socio-political idea on which the economy is based. The optimal production of goods is mainly ensured by the market system itself. And only in case of failure of the mechanism of the market system, the state intervenes in the process. At the same time, the development of a market economy has formed the following pattern: the state spends funds on the creation of mainly public (public) goods (primarily of a social nature) and eliminates negative external effects arising from the consumption of a number of private goods (for example, by implementing measures to restore the environment) .

By “government revenues” it is customary to understand current money and property transfers (transfer) from the private sector to the state. The transfer of funds can be carried out on the basis of the receipt of counter services or without any reimbursement. The objectives of income policy can be summarized in two groups:

Collection of funds for the formation of a financial fund, with the help of which it is possible to influence the macroeconomic balance;

Achieving a regulatory effect through the very technique of withdrawing resources (for example, manipulating tax rates).

The practice of a developed market economy shows that the income policy has a stronger regulatory effect compared to the spending policy. The explanation is largely of a socio-psychological nature. A person perceives the fact of withdrawal more emotionally than the case of shortfall. A whip weighs more than a gingerbread!

Forms of receiving state revenues

There are various forms and methods of accumulation of state revenues. In the most general form, the collection of funds is usually divided into tax and non-tax revenues. The latter include fees and charges. The most developed form of compulsory withdrawal of funds (without opposition of a counter service) is represented by taxes. This is the most important source of state funds. Through taxes, developed countries mobilize from 18-21% of GDP in Japan and the United States, up to 37% in Sweden and up to 50% in Denmark.

In general, the tax system as a set of forms and methods of collecting funds is a complex phenomenon. It contains a deep contradiction: on the one hand, it is necessary to ensure the withdrawal of sufficiently solid financial resources from economic entities, and on the other hand, to prevent a decrease in their business activity. The solution to this paradox is carried out through a reasonable compromise.

The tax system achieves rationality, according to the German economist X. Haller, if the following conditions are met:

Taxation should be structured in such a way that the state's costs for its implementation are as low as possible (orientation to the so-called "principle of cheap taxation");

The collection of taxes should ensure that the taxpayer's costs associated with the payment procedure are as low as possible (the principle of cheapness in paying taxes);

The payment of taxes should be as little as possible a tangible burden for the taxpayer in order not to infringe on his economic activity (the principle of limiting the burden of taxes);

Taxation should not be an obstacle either to the "internal" rational organization of production, or to its orientation to the structure of needs, i.e. "external" rationality;

The process of obtaining taxes should be organized in such a way that it could contribute to the greatest extent (through the accumulated financial resources) to the implementation of the policy of the conjuncture and employment (opportunistic efficiency);

This process should influence the distribution of income in order to make it more fair (distributive efficiency);

In the process of determining the "tax solvency" of individuals and clarifying settlements with them, it should be minimally required to provide information that affects the private life of citizens (respect for the private sphere);

It should be ensured that the combination of taxes forms a single system in which each tax has its own specific purpose. At the same time, neither mutual "overlapping" of taxes, nor the presence of "hatchholes" between them (internal isolation) should be allowed.

Stabilizing role of taxes

In a market economy, taxes automatically play an important stabilizing role. According to the definition of the German economist F. Neumark, the concept of "automatic stabilizer" (or "built-in flexibility") is a counter-cyclical internal adjustment of the state budget, which manifests itself automatically, without any measures, and follows from the nature of certain incomes or expenses.

The process of countercyclical adjustment of taxes is as follows. In the event of an overheating of the conjuncture, there is an increase in the volume of national income. In the presence of a progressively constructed scale of taxation, the amount of payments to the budget increases, which has a deterrent effect on further economic activity. In addition, the increased volume of the state budget makes it possible, with the help of social policy means, to raise the consumption level of the low-income strata and thereby increase aggregate demand, bringing it closer to the increased aggregate supply. In conditions of falling market conditions, the opposite occurs.

However, in order for the process of automatic adjustment to take place, a prerequisite is a high degree of reaction of the tax system to the conjuncture. Different taxes have different degrees of market elasticity. In turn, this is due to the methods of constructing tax rates, the very basis (i.e., the object of taxation), as well as the technique of levying taxes.

Those taxes that automatically follow the course of the conjuncture, due to the basis on which they are built (income, turnover, profit, etc.) have increased countercyclical properties. Since in developed industrial countries the core of the tax system is taxes on income, profits and turnover, these tax systems have a high degree of market elasticity.

In connection with the above, in financial theory it is customary to use the indicator of elasticity of tax revenues. It is calculated as a ratio:

Percentage (or absolute) change in tax revenue / percentage (or absolute) change in national income *100

In the German economy, for example, the degree of tax response is 1.5. This means that a 1% increase or decrease in national income results in a 1.5% increase or decrease in tax revenue.

General conclusion: the degree of reaction of the entire tax system to the situation depends on the specific weight in it of certain types of taxes. It is believed that the system has an effective market-stabilizing effect when its elasticity level is equal to 1. This happens if the value of income and corporate taxes in the tax system is sufficiently high.

The regulatory possibilities of the tax system depend not only on the totality of their types, but also on the rationally found level of taxation rates. Let us give typical examples characteristic of developed countries (Table 18.1).

Table 18.1 Taxation rates in various OECD countries and in Russia (1997,%)

Speaking about the impact of tax policy on general economic indicators, one economic aspect should be taken into account. This is the so-called "lag effect". This phenomenon is expressed in the fact that it takes a certain time for the intervention of financial policy to be able to cause the expected change in the economy.

The degree of the regulatory role of taxes is affected - and rather ambiguously - by another circumstance. In the process of paying taxes, there are cases of economic entities avoiding taxation. Underpayment of taxes can occur in two ways: in legal and illegal forms. The legal option involves the use by the taxpayer of systems of benefits or a certain degree of conditionality of regulatory prescriptions (real life, as you know, is always more complicated than any prescription made in the form of a certain generalized scheme).

Summing up the characteristics of the financial mechanism, we note that a high degree of built-in flexibility of the financial system is considered desirable for the economy. Built-in financial stabilizers have the positive aspect that they make an accurate diagnosis and forecast of the market situation not so necessary. At the same time, the advantages of built-in stabilizers should not lead to an overestimation of their capabilities. These stabilizers, as a rule, soften market fluctuations, but cannot completely prevent them.

Credit mechanism of economic policy

In the process of economic regulation, the state widely uses monetary measures. Like the financial mechanism, they have a dual aspect of expression. On the one hand, it is an integral part of the whole complex of economic policy. At the same time, credit regulation acts as a kind of instrument of state intervention in the economy.

In terms of its content, credit policy is a set of measures of the Central Bank in the field of money circulation and credit in terms of their impact on the macroeconomic process. The purpose of these measures acts as a partial refraction of the general state line aimed at ensuring an equilibrium and sustainable development of the economy.

The subject of credit policy is the Central Bank (CB). According to the law, it fulfills the goals of the government, but at the same time, as a rule, it is not a government institution. The Central Bank has a certain degree of independence. Such rights are given to him on the basis of the principle of separation of powers. As the experience of Western countries shows, this institution, which has relative independence, is not an uncomplaining executor of the will of the state. In a difficult economic situation, the government cannot demand that the credit center solve its financial problems by issuing additional money supply.

The set of tasks of the Central Bank in the implementation of economic policy contains two directions. The first is to provide the national economy with a full-fledged monetary system. A stable currency is an essential element of the market infrastructure. The second direction is related to the fact that the Central Bank is assigned the function of influencing the credit activities of private business (commercial) banks in the interests of macroeconomic policy. In the sphere of monetary circulation, the state pursues its policy, thus using cooperation with this accomplice of regulation. A kind of tandem is formed: "the state - the central bank." Practice shows the high efficiency of this cooperation.

Let's make a comparison: in the production sphere, the state does not have such an effective lever of influence. And this is no coincidence. This sector must have a high degree of freedom and independence, which is required by the very nature of the market. In this case, the state focuses on indirect ways of influencing - through monetary circulation, which is a kind of circulatory system of the economy.

Tools

Operating in the field of monetary circulation, the Central Bank uses a number of tools. Most of them have an indirect impact. This is an analogy to the general principles of the state's action in the economy. However, some operations of the credit center can also be carried out in a more direct way (a similar example is government subsidies).

In general, the structure of the measures taken by the Central Bank can be represented by the following scheme (Fig. 18.6).

Rice. 18.6. Credit policy of the Central Bank

The method of limiting the dynamics of lending lies in the fact that in some countries (England, France, Switzerland, the Netherlands) the Central Bank has the right to limit the degree of growth in credit investments of business banks in the non-banking sector. For this purpose, a percentage rate for the expansion of credit operations for a certain period of time is introduced. If the conditions are not met, the Central Bank applies sanctions: banks may be required to pay penalty interest or (as is customary in Switzerland) to transfer to an interest-free account of the Central Bank an amount equal to the amount of the excess loan.

Accounting (discount) policy refers to long-used methods of regulation. The Central Bank acts as a creditor in relation to business banks. Funds are provided subject to the rediscount of bills of banks and secured by their securities. Such funds obtained in the central credit link are called "rediscount" or "lombard" loans. Based on the law, the Central Bank has the right to manipulate the interest rate at which it issues loans to banks. The possibility of establishing the "price" of the loan acts as a method of influencing the credit system.

Resorting to such a type of regulation as "open market operations", the Central Bank buys and sells securities (for example, on the stock exchange). By selling them, the bank essentially withdraws excess balance sheet reserves of commercial banks. In macroeconomic terms, this means the withdrawal of a certain amount of money from circulation. The purchase of securities by the Central Bank contributes to the formation of additional balance reserves from commercial banks. The money supply in circulation increases. As a result, the opportunities for credit operations of business banks are expanding.

The policy of minimum reserves ensures the obligatory storage of certain sums of money of business banks in the accounts of the Central Bank. In this way, banks receive a certain element of insurance from the Central Bank when fulfilling their obligations. This method was first introduced in the US economy in 1933.

The set of regulatory measures is complemented by a system of so-called "voluntary agreements" concluded between the Central Bank and business banks. Such agreements are especially convenient when the Central Bank must make prompt decisions, act quickly and without much bureaucracy.

Problems of practical implementation of credit policy

The greatest effectiveness of the regulatory action of the Central Bank is manifested when the entire set of economic instruments is used, and in an appropriate sequence. In influencing macroeconomic regulation, the Central Bank must take into account both the interconnections of the national economy within the world economy (on the currency line) and the interdependence of the links of the national economy. In particular, we are talking about the following problematic situations.

1. Accounting policy affects not only banks, but also other sectors of the economy. The negative impact of interest fluctuations is manifested in relation to those areas of the national economy that are burdened with debts. These include: the public sector, capital-intensive industries (nuclear power plants, hydroelectric power plants), rail transport, households, and farming.

2. Interest policy leads to a growing price effect. Economic entities tend to get out of the influence of the growing discount rate by shifting their costs onto the shoulders of clients (increasing, accordingly, the price of their securities). As a result, an additional difficulty is created for the state policy in the field of curbing inflation.

In the context of the Russian economy, which is currently experiencing significant problems with inflation, this side effect is especially painful. The private sector seeks to transfer to the buyer all the additional burden that falls on him as a result of regulatory measures. The possibility of such financial resourcefulness in Russia is higher, since the degree of market saturation and competition is weaker than it is in the developed countries of the West.

3. Administrative prescription of the level of interest "from above" is not a market-oriented action. The weakening of the market fundamentals of the economy leads to undesirable consequences. For example, the result may be the strengthening of elements of the shadow economy.

Conducting economic regulation with the help of a financial or credit mechanism raises an important question for economists: in what situation is this or that option more optimal? Another problem is this: what ratio of financial and credit measures is reasonable to practice in the economy?

The predominance of financial measures in the course of regulation is usually called the "Keynesian" option for conducting economic policy. Greater emphasis on the monetary mechanism was called "monetarism" in economic science. The practice of implementing economic policy in Western countries has shown that the most rational is a combination of both directions of regulation. However, within its framework, there is always an alternating fluctuation in the direction of strengthening one or another method, depending on the state of the economic situation.

Describing the methods of state influence, one can also emphasize their organizational and institutional form.

The concept of "institutional" is relatively little used in domestic scientific circulation.

It is perceived even weaker, unfortunately, by the economic thinking of the population. Meanwhile, the development of the economy in the market-legal version puts forward the need for a much more active use of this term. It reflects the fact that the phenomena of economic life in a developed legal state lose their random character. Certain legal, ethical, psychological, organizational norms and customs seem to be layered on the surface of economic reality.

Economic policy itself is a system of institutionalized measures and traditions. Such actions related to

relatively long-term phenomenon, create the concept of "institution". According to the American economist W. Hamilton, "institutions are a verbal symbol for the best description of a group of social customs. They mean the prevailing and permanent way of thinking or acting, which has become a habit for a social group or a custom for a people."

As an example, let's name "institute of law", "institute of property". The use of the term in this sense differs somewhat, of course, from the options designated, for example, as "research institute" or "institute of noble maidens". It was the last cases of the use of this term that were more typical in domestic lexical practice.

The emphasis on the organizational and legal nature allows us to isolate some additional features of state regulation methods:

* the formation of executive structures of state power, the immediate task of which is the practical implementation of the goals of the government;

* creation and maintenance of state property objects, i.е. public sector;

* preparation of economic programs and economic forecasts;

* support for economic research centers (having different forms of ownership), economic information institutes, chambers of commerce and industry, various economic councils and unions;

* ensuring the functioning of institutions of advisers, consultants, expert councils on economic problems;

* legal, informational support for business and trade unions, rational forms of their interaction;

* participation in the creation of forms of economic integration, organization of regular international meetings on economic issues (for example, representatives of the G7 group).

A clear example of the manifestation of the institutional form of state measures is the practice that exists in Germany. This country is characterized by the special importance of legal norms and traditions in the economic sphere. A typical manifestation is, first of all, the punctual degree of development of the system of economic law.

Attention is drawn to the state's support for a system of clear and reasonable interaction between the two largest public institutions: associations of entrepreneurs and trade unions. The system of state administration is well developed and operates very effectively - through a combination of a small number of ministries (at present there are 16 such departments). The state's experience of relying on a system consisting of 6 research economic institutes and the Council of Experts (called by journalists the "council of five wise men") is very successful.