The G-20's U-Turn on Spending

At their recent meeting in South Korea, the finance ministers from the Group of 20 (G-20) countries appeared confused with behavior that seemed to reflect the volatile financial markets they have tried to supervise.

They seemed to lose their impression of having a steady hand and self-confidence in where they were taking the global economy. They suddenly lost faith in one of the two linchpins of their policies, their unorthodox fiscal policy, and defied recommendations of the international experts that they had hitherto embraced not to withdraw their fiscal stimuli until recovery became fully sustained.