Search Results
Working Paper
Indeterminacy and forecastability
Recent studies document the deteriorating performance of forecasting models during the Great Moderation. This conversely implies that forecastability is higher in the preceding era, when the economy was unexpectedly volatile. We offer an explanation for this phenomenon in the context of equilibrium indeterminacy in dynamic stochastic general equilibrium models. First, we analytically show that a model under indeterminacy exhibits richer dynamics that can improve forecastability. Then, using a prototypical New Keynesian model, we numerically demonstrate that indeterminacy due to passive ...
Journal Article
Closing Small and "Sufficiently" Large Open Economies with Different Asset Structures
There are two important dimensions that matter when we write down a model economy of a country that is open to international financial markets. The first one is its size, and the second one is its asset market structure. Small open economies are price takers so the analysis happens in partial equilibrium, while countries that are “sufficiently" large can affect international prices and the analysis happens in general equilibrium. The second important dimension is the asset market structure. If markets are complete there is full risk sharing, while if markets are incomplete there is not. In ...
Working Paper
Equilibrium with Mutual Organizations in Adverse Selection Economies
An equilibrium concept in the Debreu (1954) theory-of-value tradition is developed for a class of adverse selection economies and applied to the Spence signaling and Rothschild-Stiglitz (1976) adverse selection environments. The equilibrium exists and is optimal. Further, all equilibria have the same individual type utility vector. The economies are large with a finite number of types that maximize expected utility on an underlying commodity space. An implication of the analysis is that the invisible hand works for this class of adverse selection economies.
Report
Risk Loving and Fat Tails in the Wealth Distribution
We study the dynamic properties of the wealth distribution in an overlapping generations model with warm-glow bequests and heterogeneous attitudes towards risk. Some dynasties of agents are risk averters, and others are risk lovers. Agents can invest in two types of Lucas trees. The two types of trees are symmetric in the sense that one type has a high return in states where the other has a return of zero. This symmetry allows risk averters to perfectly ensure their future income and eliminates aggregate uncertainty in the model. Furthermore, risk lovers take extreme portfolio positions, ...
Working Paper
Finite-Order VAR Representation of Linear Rational Expectations Models: With Some Lessons for Monetary Policy
This paper considers the characterization via finite-order VARs of the solution of a large class of linear rational expectations (LRE) models. I propose a unified approach that uses a companion Sylvester equation to check the existence and uniqueness of a solution to the canonical (first-order) LRE model in finite-order VAR form and a quadratic matrix equation to characterize it decoupling the backward- and forward-looking aspects of the model. I also investigate the fundamentalness of the shocks recovered. Solving LRE models by this procedure is straightforward to implement, general in its ...
Working Paper
Monetary Policy and Macroeconomic Stability Revisited
A large literature with canonical New Keynesian models has established that the Fed's policy change from a passive to an active response to inflation led to U.S. macroeconomic stability after the Great Inflation of the 1970s. We revisit this view by estimating a staggered price model with trend inflation using a Bayesian method that allows for equilibrium indeterminacy and adopts a sequential Monte Carlo algorithm. {{p}} The model empirically outperforms a canonical New Keynesian model and demonstrates an active response to inflation even in the Great Inflation era, during which the U.S. ...
Working Paper
Inflation Gap Persistence, Indeterminacy, and Monetary Policy
Empirical studies have documented that the persistence of the gap between inflation and its trend declined after the Volcker disinflation. Previous research into the source of the decline has offered competing views while sidestepping the possibility of equilibrium indeterminacy. This paper examines the source by estimating a medium-scale DSGE model using a Bayesian method that allows for indeterminacy. The estimated model shows that the Fed's change from a passive to an active policy response to the inflation gap or a decrease in firms' probability of price change can fully account for the ...
Working Paper
Monetary Policy and Macroeconomic Stability Revisited
A large literature has established that the Fed? change from a passive to an active policy response to inflation led to US macroeconomic stability after the Great Inflation of the 1970s. This paper revisits the literature?s view by estimating a generalized New Keynesian model using a full-information Bayesian method that allows for equilibrium indeterminacy and adopts a sequential Monte Carlo algorithm. The model empirically outperforms canonical New Keynesian models that confirm the literature?s view. Our estimated model shows an active policy response to inflation even during the Great ...
Working Paper
A Generalized Approach to Indeterminacy in Linear Rational Expectations Models
We propose a novel approach to deal with the problem of indeterminacy in Linear Rational Expectations models. The method consists of augmenting the original state space with a set of auxiliary exogenous equations to provide the adequate number of explosive roots in presence of indeterminacy. The solution in this expanded state space, if it exists, is always determinate, and is identical to the indeterminate solution of the original model. The proposed approach accommodates determinacy and any degree of indeterminacy, and it can be implemented even when the boundaries of the determinacy region ...
Working Paper
A Matter of Perspective: Mapping Linear Rational Expectations Models into Finite-Order VAR Form
This paper considers the characterization of the reduced-form solution of a large class of linear rational expectations models. I show that under certain conditions, if a solution exists and is unique, it can be cast in finite-order VAR form. I also investigate the conditions for the VAR form to be stationary with a well-defined residual variance-covariance matrix in equilibrium, for the shocks to be recoverable, and for local identification of the structural parameters for estimation from the sample likelihood. An application to the workhorse New Keynesian model with accompanying Matlab ...