torsten: u.s.tion, what are the instruments and the tools of monetary policy and fiscal policy? it becomes immediately clear that fiscal policy just has endless amounts of tools and instruments they can turn on to make sure something happens, whereas monetary policy really only has interest rates. so if you want to solve any problem, if you want to increase spending, increase whatever capex, whatever you want to do, which is the right tool to use? what can interest rates do if you are trying to help with inequality problem that we have? there are probably some things they can do with asset prices, stock prices, home prices. over the last several years, lifting stock prices and home prices have been a very important part of qe for the fed. romaine: so if the fed does start to make a push towards this distributional outcome, how do you defend that in the face of the idea that the fed should be this independent -- the idea a rising tide lifts all boats that gave it a buffer from being a political arm?

torsten: this is an important question.there is this uncertainty in terms of planning for cap x, it could be that the trade war to go away with a phase one deal. is, what if other uncertainties appear? willegin to worry, corporate spend? or could be an excuse for them for holding back and say, we won't take out that spending? romaine: some breaking news. nike just crossing the wire. it raised its quarterly dividends. it had been $.22 a share. it is going up to 24.5 cents a a share..24.5 it appears to be an annual increase they do that they have been doing for the past two years. this is bloomberg. ♪ ♪ funds disclosing their third-quarter investments. the 13f filings are coming fast and furious. standing by his abigail doolittle. >> we have found out quite a bit. the 13f for berkshire hathaway has been released. that is one everyone eagerly anticipates. there have been changes to the portfolio. they have reduced for positions. we have apple reduce, not in a big way, but it was a cut to apple's position. a bigger cut to wells

i‘m joined by torsten bell, the chief executive of the resolution foundation, a think tank focusing ons being ended. we have known for four years that it would come to an end this april, and the government isjust would come to an end this april, and the government is just confirming that, but clearly it is welcome. just describe what this freeze to benefits, how long it has been in place and what it has meant for people affected by it. it has been very bad news indeed. george osborne announced that all benefits, income replacement benefits that you get through the week and lots of others, would be frozen from 2016 to 2019. those four years have passed, so next year is the first year the go up. they go up in line with prices, so up. they go up in line with prices, so still more slowly than earnings. they are going up 1.7%? yes. which is better than nothing, obviously. the work and pensions secretary is saying, we are clear that the best way for people to improve their lives is through work, but we know that some people require additional support. our fiscally approach that some people r

but then interesting, this little nugget from torsten bell, of the resolution foundation.e worked for ed miliband, saying that whilst those numbers sound modest, the conservative ones relative to labour, it would amount to the biggest increase in the size of the state, 1.1% of stocks and shares, under any tory prime minister since harold macmillan. so, in terms ofjust that conversation about austerity and the end of austerity, money going into public services that was taken out of them under previous conservative administration or the coalition. that is right. and i think we were talking about this last week, when true? that's one of the things that this election is injunction about, it is the end of the common sort of, pull— back the squeeze on the state, the retrenchment, the kind of post—crash, you know, if you think about it in really big historical blocks, enormous crash, government shovels and loads and those of money to avert disaster. next government spends years and years trying to pull back that money. we are now the start of the next phase, where whoever wins is