Search Results
Working Paper
Targeted search in matching markets
We propose a parsimonious matching model where people's choice of whom to meet endogenizes the degree of randomness in matching. The analysis highlights the interaction between a productive motive, driven by the surplus attainable in a match, and a strategic motive, driven by reciprocity of interest of potential matches. We find that the interaction between these two motives differs with preferences ? vertical versus horizontal ? and that this interaction implies that preferences estimated using our model can look markedly different from those estimated using a model where the degree of ...
Working Paper
Self-confirming Price Dispersion in Monetary Economies
In a monetary economy, we show that price dispersion arises as an equilibrium outcome without the need for costly simultaneous search or any heterogeneity in preferences, production costs, or search technologies. A distribution of money holdings among buyers makes sellers indifferent across a set of posted prices, leading to a non-degenerate price distribution. This price distribution, in turn, makes buyers indifferent across a range of money balances, rationalizing the non-degenerate distribution of money holdings. We completely characterize the distribution of posted prices and money ...
Working Paper
Trade Dynamics in the Market for Federal Funds
We develop a model of the market for federal funds that explicitly accounts for its two distinctive features: banks have to search for a suitable counterparty, and once they meet, both parties negotiate the size of the loan and the repayment. The theory is used to answer a number of positive and normative questions: What are the determinants of the fed funds rate? How does the market reallocate funds? Is the market able to achieve an efficient reallocation of funds? We also use the model for theoretical and quantitative analyses of policy issues facing modern central banks.
Report
Trade dynamics in the market for federal funds
We use minute-by-minute daily transaction-level payments data to document the cross-sectional and time-series behavior of the estimated prices and quantities negotiated by commercial banks in the interbank market. We study the frequency and volume of trade, the size distribution of loans, the distribution of bilateral rates, and the intraday dynamics of the reserve balances held by commercial banks. We find evidence of the importance of the liquidity provision achieved by commercial banks that act as de facto intermediaries of funds.
Working Paper
Goods-Market Frictions and International Trade
We present a tractable framework that embeds goods-market frictions in a general equilibrium dynamic model with heterogeneous exporters and identical importers. These frictions arise because it takes time and expense for exporters and importers to meet. We show that search frictions lead to an endogenous fraction of unmatched exporters, alter the gains from trade, endogenize entry costs, and imply that the competitive equilibrium does not generally result in the socially optimal number of searching firms. Finally, ignoring search frictions results in biased estimates of the effect of tariffs ...
Report
The over-the-counter theory of the fed funds market: a primer
We present a dynamic over-the-counter model of the fed funds market, and use it to study the determination of the fed funds rate, the volume of loans traded, and the intraday evolution of the distribution of reserve balances across banks. We also investigate the implications of changes in the market structure, as well as the effects of central bank policy instruments such as open market operations, the Discount Window lending rate, and the interest rate on bank reserves.
Working Paper
Using the Eye of the Storm to Predict the Wave of Covid-19 UI Claims
We leverage an event-study research design focused on the seven costliest hurricanes to hit the US mainland since 2004 to identify the elasticity of unemployment insurance filings with respect to search intensity. Applying our elasticity estimate to the state-level Google Trends indexes for the topic “unemployment,” we show that out-of-sample forecasts made ahead of the official data releases for March 21 and 28 predicted to a large degree the extent of the Covid-19 related surge in the demand for unemployment insurance. In addition, we provide a robust assessment of the uncertainty ...
Working Paper
Goods-Market Frictions and International Trade
We add goods-market frictions to a general equilibrium dynamic model with heterogeneous exporting producers and identical importing retailers. Our tractable framework leads to endogenously unmatched producers, which attenuate welfare responses to foreign shocks but increase the trade elasticity relative to a model without search costs. Search frictions are quantitatively important in our calibration, attenuating welfare responses to tariffs by 40 percent and increasing the trade elasticity by 50 percent. Eliminating search costs raises welfare by 1 percent and increasing them by only a few ...
Working Paper
Goods-Market Frictions and International Trade
We present a tractable framework that embeds goods-market frictions in a general equilibrium dynamic model with heterogeneous exporters and identical importers. These frictions arise because it is time consuming and expensive for exporters and importers to meet. We show that search frictions lead to an endogenous fraction of unmatched exporters, alter the gains from trade, endogenize entry costs, and imply that the competitive equilibrium does not generally result in the socially optimal number of searching firms. Finally, ignoring search frictions results in biased estimates of the effect of ...
Working Paper
Nonlinear Unemployment Effects of the Inflation Tax
We argue that long-run inflation has nonlinear and state-dependent effects on unemployment, output, and welfare. Using panel data from the OECD, we document three correlations. First, there is a positive long-run relationship between anticipated inflation and unemployment. Second, there is also a positive correlation between anticipated inflation and unemployment volatility. Third, the long-run inflation-unemployment relationship is not only positive, but also stronger when unemployment is higher. We show that these correlations arise in a standard monetary search model with two shocks – ...