E52 - Monetary Policy
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Optimal Policy under Commitment and Price Level Stationarity
This paper proposes a simple analytical method to determine the stationarity of an unnormalized variable from the solution to a normalized model i.e. a model whose variables must be expressed in relative terms or must be differenced for a solution to exist. -
Are Commodity Prices Useful Leading Indicators of Inflation?
Commodity prices have increased dramatically and persistently over the past several years, followed by a sharp reversal in recent months. These large and persistent movements in commodity prices raise questions about their implications for global inflation. The process of globalization has motivated much debate over whether global factors have become more important in driving the […] -
Canada and the IMF: Trailblazer or Prodigal Son?
Canada played an important role in the postwar establishment of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), yet it was also the first major member to challenge the orthodoxy of the BrettonWoods par value system by abandoning it in 1950 in favour of a floating, market-determined exchange rate. -
Monetary Policy Lag, Zero Lower Bound, and Inflation Targeting
Although the concept of monetary policy lag has historical roots deep in the monetary economics literature, relatively little attention has been paid to the idea. In this paper, we build on Svensson's (1997) inflation targeting framework by explicitly taking into account the lagged effect of monetary policy and characterize the optimal monetary policy reaction function both in the absence and in the presence of the zero lower bound on the nominal interest rate. -
Price Level Targeting in a Small Open Economy with Financial Frictions: Welfare Analysis
How important are the benefits of low price-level uncertainty? This paper explores the desirability of price-level path targeting in an estimated DSGE model fit to Canadian data. The policy implications are based on social welfare evaluations. -
Adopting Price-Level Targeting under Imperfect Credibility: An Update
This paper measures the welfare gains of switching from inflation-targeting to price-level targeting under imperfect credibility. Vestin (2006) shows that when the monetary authority cannot commit to future policy, price-level targeting yields higher welfare than inflation targeting. -
The Role of Bank Capital in the Propagation of Shocks
Recent events in financial markets have underlined the importance of analyzing the link between the financial health of banks and real economic activity. This paper contributes to this analysis by constructing a dynamic general equilibrium model in which the balance sheet of banks affects the propagation of shocks. -
Aggregate and Welfare Effects of Redistribution of Wealth Under Inflation and Price-Level Targeting
Since the work of Doepke and Schneider (2006a) and Meh and Terajima (2008), we know that inflation causes major redistribution of wealth – between households and the government, between nationals and foreigners, and between households within the same country. -
Are Bygones not Bygones? Modeling Price Level Targeting with an Escape Clause and Lessons from the Gold Standard
Like the gold standard, price level targeting (PT) involves not letting past deviations of inflation be bygones; both regimes return the price level (or price of gold) to its target. The experience of suspension of the gold standard in World War I, resumption in the 1920s (for some countries at a different parity), and final abandonment is reviewed.