Vitor Gaspar is one of the world's most important economists. The IMF was founded 80 years ago to assist countries in economic trouble. This assistance involve using sticks as well as providing carrots. Those sticks involve cutting spending, raising taxes, restructuring tax and benefit programs, and limiting monetary finance. As the IMF's top fiscal official, Vitor has enormous influence on IMF policy and, thereby, global economic progress.
This podcast covers lots of economic ground, from U.S. deficit policy, to the global economic outlook, to resolving the near depression in Southern Europe in the aftermath of the Great Recession, to getting the IMF to do proper long-term fiscal gap accounting.
Vitor's is a remarkable success story. Before joining the IMF almost a decade back, Vitor served as Portugal's Minister of State and Finance, Director General of Research at the European Central Bank, Director of Economic Studies and Statistics at Portugal's Central Bank, and Director of Economic Studies at the Portuguese Ministry of Finance. Mr. Gaspar holds a Ph.D. and a post-doctoral agregado in Economics from Universidade Nova de Lisboa; he graduated from Universidade Católica Portuguesa.
Economic Matters - The podcast is hosted by Laurence Kotlikoff and moderated by Alex Kotlikoff.
Laurence Kotlikoff is a Boston University Economist, a NY Times Best Selling Author, President of maxifi.com, and Author of Money Magic.
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Talking Global Fiscal Policy with the IMF's Director of Fiscal Affairs -- Vitor Gaspar