The economy of the Republic of Korea (henceforth Korea) has been on a steady growth path despite the global financial and eurozone crises. Recently, Fitch and S&P, the global credit rating agencies, upgraded Korea’s sovereign credit rating by one notch. Fitch’s rating for Korea, AA-, is the fourth-highest rating on its rating scale and a notch higher than those of the PRC and Japan. Notwithstanding these positive signs, Korea’s economy faces many internal and external challenges. One of the most serious is excessive household debt. Korea’s household debt has increased drastically since 2000. For the past 12 years, household debt has increased by an average of 13.3% every year, far in excess of the average annual nominal GDP growth rate of 6.2% during the same period.

In analysing the European financial crisis, Asia’s experience with the 1997 Asian financial crisis is a useful point of reference. After the forced devaluation of the Thai baht, encouraged by the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and Japan, Thailand was compelled to accept the IMF-imposed austerity programs. As part of the contagion that followed the baht crisis, Indonesia and the Republic of Korea also accepted the IMF program. As the IMF’s prescriptions reduced aggregate demand and contained no “pro-growth” elements, they worsened the crisis in these Asian countries. In contrast, Malaysia rejected the IMF’s prescriptions. The different experiences of these crisis-hit Asian economies led to a change in thinking on the productiveness of “straight” austerity programs as a response to the financial crises. Austerity policies were relaxed and pro-growth policies introduced, which in combination, helped Asia to recover from its financial crisis.

The international dollar standard is malfunctioning. The Fed’s reduction of the interest rate on Federal Funds to virtually zero in December 2008 (a move that was followed by major European central banks) exacerbated the wide interest rate differentials with emerging markets and provoked world monetary instability by inducing massive hot money outflows by carry traders into Asia and Latin America. The disruption could be partially justified if it had helped the United States recover from the 2008–2009 financial crisis. However, evidence suggests otherwise. Speculative money flooding into emerging markets by “carry traders” causes local currencies to be overvalued.

Two episodes of quantitative easing (QE) by the United States (US) Federal Reserve Bank (Fed) since early 2009 aroused widespread concerns in emerging Asia and elsewhere because of the possibility that they would weaken the US dollar (so-called “currency wars”) and stimulate capital inflows in emerging economies that might lead to increased inflationary pressures and asset price bubbles. For example, the vice minister of finance of the People’s Republic of China (PRC), Zhu Guangyao, said on 18 November 2010 that “As a major reserve currency issuer, for the US to launch a second round of quantitative easing at this time, we feel that it did not recognize its responsibility to stabilize global markets and did not think about the impact of excessive liquidity on emerging markets” (Reuters 2010).