Prof. Volker Wieland and co-authors awarded the 2023 Regulatory Policy Prize
f.l.t.r.: Prof. Lars Feld, Prof. Volker Wieland; Photo: Familienunternehmer.eu, Anne Großmann Fotografie
Together with Prof. Lars P. Feld and Prof. Christoph M. Schmidt, Prof. Volker Wieland has received the 2023 Regulatory Policy Award from the German Business Association of Family Companies. The three former members of the German Council of Economic Experts were honored for their joint opinion piece "Time has come for supply-oriented fiscal policy," which was published in the "Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung" in December 2022.
The €10,000 prize is awarded for a publication that analyzes the regulatory impact of a political measure or development and provides impetus on how to master the economic and social challenges of the day.
"The less policymakers know where they want to go and which instruments to choose, the more they take refuge in spending money. All it takes is to declare the challenges sufficiently epochal and the over-spending competition for billions begins. But is there a compass to turn these issues around for the better?" said Marie-Christine Ostermann, President of the Family Business Association, at the award ceremony in Berlin on Wednesday evening.
According to the jury, the authors provide an answer to this question in their award-winning article, in which they argue for a supply-oriented fiscal policy to overcome the phase of low growth and high inflation. Fiscal policy measures should only be used selectively to provide relief where certain sections of the population cannot cope with the sharp price increases, for example in energy. Beyond that, however, fiscal policy should be supply-oriented, i.e. aimed at increasing the overall economic supply of products and services, according to the award statement. In addition to entrepreneurs, the jury also includes Prof. Clemens Fuest, president of the Munich-based Ifo Institute, and Prof. Henning Vöpel, chairman of the Center for European Policy.
"It must once again be worthwhile in Germany to work, invest and take risks. The authors explain this more than clearly in their article," Ostermann continued.
Prof. Volker Wieland was a member of the Council of Economic Experts from March 2013 to April 2022; the panel's former chairs, Schmidt and Feld, retired in 2020 and 2021, respectively. Feld is head of the Walter Eucken Institute in Freiburg, Schmidt heads the RWI - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research in Essen. Wieland is professor of monetary economics and executive director of the Institute for Monetary and Financial Usability (IMFS) at Goethe University.