financial repression

plural financial repressions

1. businessA set of government policies to reduce the real burden of government debt, such as capital controls or interest rate caps.

   Ms Reinhart and Ms Sbrancia argue the world has forgotten that the widespread system of financial repression “played an instrumental role in reducing or ‘liquidating’ the massive stocks of debt accumulated during World War II”.

   2011 May 9, Gillian Tett, “Policymakers learn a new and alarming catchphrase”, in Financial Times

   1 more example

   Two main features of the 1950s were inflation and financial repression. […] Financial repression was used in the 1950s to prevent people and companies from using their financial assets as they chose. Although there is no precise definition of financial repression, one aspect of it is the imposition of restraints on financial institutions which go beyond those that are required to ensure that they are prudently managed.

   2014, William A. Allen, Monetary Policy and Financial Repression in Britain, 1951–59, Springer, →ISBN