A central bank’s job is to uphold in practice Say’s Law – the principle that output is balanced by demand, with neither too little demand to purchase what is produced (which would cause unemployment) nor too much (which would cause inflation) – because Say’s Law certainly does not hold in theory. In other words, a central bank’s primary responsibility is not to preserve the health of the firms that make up the banking sector, but rather to maintain the robust functioning of the economy as a whole.
另一方可以称为宏观经济阵营，它认为中央银行需要管理作为一个整体的经济。中央银行的责任是支持萨伊定律的实践——即产出由需求来平衡，使需求既不能太少以至于无法买走生产出来的东西（这会造成失业），也不能太多（这会造成通胀）——因为萨伊定律在理论上肯定是无法维持的。换句话说，中央银行的首要责任不是保护企业健康、造就银行部门，而是维持作为一个整体的经济的鲁棒运行。