The Concluding Remarks of the Governor of the Bank of Italy for the year 1946

Abstract

During his tenure as Governor of the Bank of Italy Einaudi transformed the Annual Report of the Bank into an exercise quite different from a mere description of the activities of the Bank. It became a full account and analysis of economic transformation, and the Final Considerations, read aloud in the presence of all the political and economic establishment of the country, became a permanent occasion for complete reassessments of governmental economic policy by an independent technical body. In 1947, Einaudi described a country emerging defeated from World War, trying to recover confiscated resources and occupied territories, dealing with reconstruction but burdened by debt, deficit and an inflated paper circulation. Einaudi’s analysis of the difficulties of reconstruction and of the growing inflation anticipated a vigorous shift in economic policy. Only a few months later Einaudi introduced, as budget minister, a plan to combat inflation through both a banking restriction and budget cuts, and successfully implemented it.

First published as Annual Report of the Governor of the Banca d’Italia to the Shareholders of the Bank, at the Ordinary General Meeting held in Rome on March 31st, 1947, on the Bank’s Activity for the year 1946 (Rome: Printing Office of the Banca d’Italia, 1947). The text was originally translated into English in an abridged version by the Bank of Italy and only the final considerations have been reproduced here, without the analysis of the balance sheet and the ordinary activities of the Bank of Italy.