This, together with measures by the government, had been effective in pushing up economic activity and prices even under the first challenge -- the lower bound on interest rates -- and Japan's economy achieved a situation where it was no longer in deflation, in the sense of a sustained decline in prices (Chart 6).
In such a situation we can only repeat that the support of other policies would speed up the return of inflation to 2%. But this must not be seen as a call for an ex ante policy mix with a monetisation of public debt or mutualisation of debt via Eurobonds under the present Treaty. This would mean giving up monetary dominance.