Challenges and Choices in Post-Crisis East-Asia: Simulations of Investment Policy Reform in an Intertemporal, Global Model

Abstract

The East Asian financial crisis exposed the problems of excessive government intervention in credit allocation and poor supervision of the banking system. We argue that the crisis is an opportunity to reformulate the strategies of growth by way of eliminating politicized intervention on investment. In an intertemporal general equilibrium model, we examine the adjustment processes of the crisis-hit region and the world economies, and investigate the removal of the investment subsidies. Our results suggest that the immediate impact of the crisis on the Asian economies is a contraction of GDP and investment. We also find significant welfare gains in the crisis-hit economies in response to elimination of the subsidies to firm's investment.