Search Results
Working Paper
Inflation and Deflationary Biases in Inflation Expectations
We explore the consequences of losing confidence in the price-stability objective of central banks by quantifying the inflation and deflationary biases in inflation expectations. In a model with an occasionally binding zero-lower-bound constraint, we show that an inflation bias as well as a deflationary bias exist as a steady-state outcome. We assess the predictions of this model using unique individual-level inflation expectations data across nine countries that allow for a direct identification of these biases. Both inflation and deflationary biases are present (and sizable) in inflation ...
Working Paper
Inflation and Deflationary Biases in the Distribution of Inflation Expectations: Theory and Empirical Evidence from Nine Countries
We explore the consequences of losing confidence in the price stability objective of central banks by studying the resulting inflation and deflationary biases in medium-run inflation expectations. In a model with heterogeneous household perceptions of an occasionally binding zero-lower-bound constraint and of monetary policy objectives, we show that the estimated model-implied distribution of households' inflation expectations matches several characteristics of the empirical distribution when featuring both inflation and deflationary biases. We then directly identify these biases using unique ...
Working Paper
A Promised Value Approach to Optimal Monetary Policy
This paper characterizes optimal commitment policy in the New Keynesian model using a novel recursive formulation of the central bank's infinite horizon optimization problem. In our recursive formulation motivated by Kydland and Prescott (1980), promised inflation and output gap---as opposed to lagged Lagrange multipliers---act as pseudo-state variables. Using three well known variants of the model---one featuring inflation bias, one featuring stabilization bias, and one featuring a lower bound constraint on nominal interest rates---we show that the proposed formulation sheds new light on the ...