Working Paper

The Risky Steady State and the Interest Rate Lower Bound

Abstract: Even when the policy rate is currently not constrained by its effective lower bound (ELB), the possibility that the policy rate will become constrained in the future lowers today's inflation by creating tail risk in future inflation and thus reducing expected inflation. In an empirically rich model calibrated to match key features of the U.S. economy, we find that the tail risk induced by the ELB causes inflation to undershoot the target rate of 2 percent by as much as 45 basis points at the economy's risky steady state. Our model suggests that achieving the inflation target may be more difficult now than before the Great Recession, if the recent ELB experience has led households and firms to revise up their estimate of the ELB frequency.

Keywords: Deflationary Bias; Disinflation; Inflation Targeting; Risky Steady State; Tail Risk; Zero Lower Bound;

JEL Classification: E32; E52;

https://doi.org/10.17016/FEDS.2016.009

Bibliographic Information

Provider: Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.)

Part of Series: Finance and Economics Discussion Series

Publication Date: 2016-02-12

Number: 2016-9

Pages: 51 pages