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Speech
Opening remarks at the Transatlantic Economy: Convergence or Divergence Conference
Remarks at the Transatlantic Economy: Convergence or Divergence Conference, Federal Reserve Bank of New York, New York City.
Working Paper
Bubbly Recessions
We develop a tractable rational bubbles model with financial frictions, downward nominal wage rigidity, and the zero lower bound. The interaction of financial frictions and nominal rigidities leads to a "bubbly pecuniary externality," where competitive speculation in risky bubbly assets can result in excessive investment booms that precede inefficient busts. The collapse of a large bubble can push the economy into a "secular stagnation" equilibrium, where the zero lower bound and the nominal wage rigidity constraint bind, leading to a persistent and inefficient recession. We evaluate a ...
Working Paper
Demographics and Real Interest Rates Across Countries and Over Time
We explore the implications of demographic trends for the evolution of real interest rates across countries and over time. To that end, we develop a tractable three-country general equilibrium model with imperfect capital mobility and country-specific demographic trends. We calibrate the model to study how low-frequency movements in a country's real interest rate depend on its own and other countries' demographic factors, given a certain degree of financial integration. The more financially integrated a country is, the higher the sensitivity of its real interest rate to global developments ...
Discussion Paper
At the N.Y. Fed: The Transatlantic Economy: Convergence or Divergence?
On April 18, 2016, the New York Fed hosted a conference on current and future policy directions for the linked economies of Europe and the United States. “The Transatlantic Economy: Convergence or Divergence?”—organized jointly with the Centre for Economic Policy Research and the European Commission—brought together U.S. and Europe-based policymakers, regulators, and academics to discuss a series of important issues: Are the economies of the euro area and the United States on a convergent or divergent path? Are financial regulatory reforms making the banking and financial structures ...
Working Paper
Why Aging Induces Deflation and Secular Stagnation
We provide a quantitative theory of deflation and secular stagnation. In our lifecycle framework, an aging population puts persistent downward pressure on the price level, real interest rates, and output. A novel feature of our theory is that it also recognizes the reactions of government policy. The central bank responds to falling prices by reducing its policy nominal interest rate, and the fiscal authority responds by allowing the public debt–gross domestic product ratio to rise.
Working Paper
Understanding Persistent ZLB: Theory and Assessment
We develop a theoretical framework that rationalizes two hypotheses of long-lasting low interest rate episodes: deflationary-expectations-traps and secular stagnation in a unified setting. These hypotheses differ in the sign of the theoretical correlation between inflation and output growth that they imply. Using the data from Japan over 1998:Q1-2019:Q4, we find that the data favor the expectations-trap hypothesis. The superior model fit of the expectations trap relies on its ability to generate the observed negative correlation between inflation and output growth.
Working Paper
The Impact of the Dodd-Frank Act on Small Business
There are concerns that the Dodd-Frank Act (DFA) has impeded small-business lending. By increasing the fixed regulatory compliance requirements needed to make business loans and operate a bank, the DFA disproportionately reduced the incentives for all banks to make very modest loans and reduced the viability of small banks, whose small-business share of commercial and industrial (C&I) loans is generally much higher than that of larger banks. Despite an economic recovery, the small-loan share of C&I loans at large banks and banks with $300 or more million in assets has fallen 9 percentage ...
Working Paper
Why Have Interest Rates Fallen Far Below the Return on Capital
Risk-free rates have been falling since the 1980s while the return on capital has not. We analyze these trends in a calibrated OLG model with recursive preferences, designed to encompass many of the "usual suspects'' cited in the debate on secular stagnation. Declining labor force and productivity growth imply a limited decline in real interest rates and deleveraging cannot account for the joint decline in the risk free rate and increase in the risk premium. If we allow for a change in the (perceived) risk to productivity growth to fit the data, we find that the decline in the risk-free rate ...