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Does consumption smoothing fundamentally decrease during macroeconomic disasters? This paper uses a large historical dataset (1870–2016) for 16 industrial economies to show that during macroeconomic disasters (e.g., wars, pandemics, depressions) aggregate consumption and income are significantly less decoupled than during normal times.

Financial constraints deter firms from pursuing optimal investment plans. In China, we find privately owned firms face greater financial constraints than state-owned enterprises (SOEs). This can be explained by our finding that lenders appear less concerned about the credit risk of SOEs, which causes distortions in the allocation of credit.

We revisit an old question: how do financial constraints affect the transmission of monetary policy to the real economy? To answer this question, we propose a simple empirical strategy that combines firm-level employment and balance sheet data, identified monetary policy shocks and survey data on financing activities.

Using Canadian matched employer-employee data, we show that working hours of different workers are gross complements in production rather than perfect substitutes, as is typically assumed by macroeconomic models of production.

A low level of the neutral rate of interest increases the likelihood that a central bank’s policy rate will reach its effective lower bound (ELB) in future economic downturns. In a low neutral rate environment, using an extended monetary policy toolkit including forward guidance helps address the ELB challenge. Using the Bank’s Terms-of-Trade Economic Model, we assess the benefits and limitations of a state-contingent forward guidance implemented within a flexible inflation targeting framework.

When countries are hit by supply shocks, central banks often face the dilemma of either looking through such shocks or reacting to them to ensure that inflation expectations remain anchored. In this paper, we propose a tractable framework to capture this dilemma and then explore optimal policy under a range of assumptions about how expectations are formed.

How do households respond when they receive unanticipated income, such as an inheritance or government stimulus cheque? This paper studies these windfall income shocks through a model of household behaviour that generates a realistic consumption response for households along the entire distribution of wealth.

This paper examines household-level data from the Canadian Survey of Consumer Expectations (CSCE) to understand households’ expectations about price and wage inflation, how those expectations link to views about labour market conditions and the subsequent impact on households’ outlook for real spending growth.

We study economies where firms acquire capital in primary markets then retrade it in secondary markets after information on idiosyncratic productivity arrives. Our secondary markets incorporate bilateral trade with search, bargaining and liquidity frictions.

We examine the potential impacts of a severe economic shock on the resilience of major banks in Canada. We find these banks would suffer significant financial losses but nevertheless remain resilient. This underscores the role well-capitalized banks and sound underwriting practices play in supporting economic activity in a downturn.