This article summarizes the proceedings of a conference hosted by the Bank of Canada in November 1999.
Three major themes emerged at the conference. The first concerned uncertainty about the transmission mechanism by which monetary policy affects output and inflation. The second concerned the potential usefulness of monetary aggregates in guiding the economy along a stable non-inflationary growth path. The third was the recent developments in dynamic monetary general-equilibrium models.
The work presented suggests that a wide range of models is useful for understanding the various paths by which monetary policy actions might influence the economy.