The covid-19 pandemic that began in China at the end of 2019 triggered a global economic crisis of considerable magnitude. It began as a significant worldwide slowdown in production and in exchanges of goods and merchandise, followed by a very sharp fall in household consumption because of a fall in household income due to enforced inactivity.
If nothing had been done to counter the effects of the pandemic, there would have been a string of worldwide business failures and considerable job losses.
The Governor of the Banque de France, François Villeroy de Galhau, and Laurence Boone, Chief Economist and Deputy General Secretary of the OECD, explain how monetary authorities and governments reacted to avoid that harmful sequence of events.
Published on 05 April 2022. Updated on 27 April 2022