Search Results
Journal Article
The interest cost-push controversy
An abstract for this article is not available
Monograph
Some recent developments in Phillips curve analysis
Originally appeared in the Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond Economic Review, Jan/Feb 1978
Working Paper
Wicksell's monetary framework and dynamic stability
Traditionally, central banks seeking to stabilize general prices have followed policies similar to those advocated by Knut Wicksell: when prices are higher that desired, raise interest rates to exert downward pressure on prices, and conversely. Despite the historical predominance of interest rate-based monetary policies, analysts frequently focus on how prices are affected by control of the money stock (or its high-powered base). In those cases where they do examine the relationship between interest rates and prices, they mostly do so in a Keynesian framework rather than a Wicksellian one. ...
Journal Article
Lender of last resort: the concept in history
Henry Thornton (1760-1815) and Walter Bagehot (1826-1877) laid down a set of rules for stopping banking panics and crises. Known collectively as the classical theory of the lender of last resort, those rule stressed (1) protecting the aggregate money stock, not individual institutions, (2) letting insolvent institutions fail, (3) accommodating sound but temporarily illiquid institutions only, (4) charging penalty rates, (5) requiring good collateral, and (6) preannouncing these conditions in advance of crises so as to remove uncertainty. These precepts continue to inform central bank policy ...
Journal Article
The early history of the box diagram
Journal Article
A simple model of Irving Fisher's price-level stabilization
Fishers advice to the policymakers: Adjust the money stock to correct price-level deviations from target. He neglected to say whether money should respond (1) to the gap between actual and target prices, (2) to the gaps rate of change, (3) to the gaps cumulative value over time, or (4) to some combination of these. While all four versions of Fishers rule deliver price stability in the model presented here, the first does so more promptly and smoothly than the others and outperforms a constant money-stock rule as well.
Journal Article
Ricardo versus Thornton on the appropriate monetary response to supply shocks
David Ricardo (1772-1823) recommended countering supply shocks with monetary contraction. Henry Thornton (1760-1815) advised a constant-money response. Their views hinged (1) on the neutrality or non-neutrality of money-stock changes on real output and employment and (2) on the costs of inflation. These same considerations influence Federal Reserve policy in response to oil shocks today.
Journal Article
Book review: The real Adam Smith
Adam Smith's lost legacy by Gavin Kennedy