scholarly journals Redistribution and the Monetary-Fiscal Policy Mix

2021 ◽  
Vol 2021 (013) ◽  
pp. 1-47
Author(s):  
Saroj Bhattarai ◽  
◽  
Jae Won Lee ◽  
Choongryul Yang ◽  
◽  
...  

We show that the effectiveness of redistribution policy in stimulating the economy and improving welfare is directly tied to how much inflation it generates, which in turn hinges on monetary-fiscal adjustments that ultimately finance the transfers. We compare two distinct types of monetary-fiscal adjustments: In the monetary regime, the government eventually raises taxes to finance transfers, while in the fiscal regime, inflation rises, effectively imposing inflation taxes on public debt holders. We show analytically in a simple model how the fiscal regime generates larger and more persistent inflation than the monetary regime. In a quantitative application, we use a two-sector, two-agent New Keynesian model, situate the model economy in a COVID-19 recession, and quantify the effects of the transfer components of the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act. We find that the transfer multipliers are significantly larger under the fiscal regime—which results in a milder contraction—than under the monetary regime, primarily because inflationary pressures of this regime counteract the deflationary forces during the recession. Moreover, redistribution produces a Pareto improvement under the fiscal regime.

2018 ◽  
Vol 23 (8) ◽  
pp. 3457-3482 ◽  
Author(s):  
Valerio Ercolani ◽  
João Valle e Azevedo

Some recent empirical evidence questions the typically large size of government spending multipliers when the nominal interest rate is stuck at zero, finding output multipliers of around 1 or even lower, with an upper bound of around 1.5 in some circumstances. In this paper, we use a recent estimate of the degree of substitutability between private and government consumption in an otherwise standard New Keynesian model to show that this channel significantly reduces the size of government spending multipliers obtained when the nominal interest rate is at zero. All else being equal, the relationship of substitutability makes a government spending shock crowd out private consumption while being less inflationary, thus, limiting the typically expansionary effect of the fall in the real interest rate. Subject to the nominal interest rate being constrained at zero, the model generates output multipliers ranging from 0.8 to 1.6.


2011 ◽  
Vol 3 (3) ◽  
pp. 29-52 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roberto M Billi

This paper studies the optimal long-run inflation rate (OIR) in a small New Keynesian model, where the only policy instrument is a short-term nominal interest rate that may occasionally run against a zero lower bound (ZLB). The model allows for worst-case scenarios of misspecification. The analysis shows first, if the government optimally commits, the OIR is below 1 percent annually. Second, if the government re-optimizes each period, the OIR rises markedly to 17 percent. Third, if the government commits only to an inertial Taylor rule, the inflation bias is eliminated at very low cost in terms of welfare for the representative household. (JEL E12, E31, E43, E52, E58)


2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Le Thanh Ha ◽  
Finch Nigel

PurposeThis paper analyzes variations in effects of monetary and fiscal shocks on responses of macroeconomic variables, determinacy region and welfare costs due to changes in trend inflation.Design/methodology/approachThe authors develops the New-Keynesian model, which the central banks can employ either nominal interest rate (IR rule) or money supply (MS rule) to conduct monetary policies. They also use their budgets for capital and recurrent spending to conduct fiscal policies. By using simulated method of moment (SMM) for parameter estimation, the authors characterize Vietnam's economy during 1996Q1 -2015Q1.FindingsThe results report that consequences of monetary policy and fiscal policy shocks become more serious if there is a rise in trend inflation. Furthermore, the money supply might not be an effective instrument and using the government budget for recurrent spending produces severe consequences in the high-trend-inflation economy.Originality/valueThis is the first paper that examines the effects of trend inflation on the monetary and fiscal policy implementation in the case of Vietnam.


2020 ◽  
pp. 1-22
Author(s):  
Xue Li ◽  
Joseph H. Haslag

The purpose of this paper is to focus directly on the phase shift. For one thing, we ask whether a New Keynesian sticky-price model economy can account for both countercyclical prices and procyclical inflation. We present findings in which the price level is countercyclical and the inflation rate is procyclical. We proceed to use the model economy as an identification mechanism. What set of individual shocks are necessary to account for the phase shift? That set contains the price markup shock. Next, we ask what set of shocks are sufficient to account for the phase shift. This set contains three elements: the price markup and wage markup shocks along with the government spending shock. The results are important as a building block. We infer that price stickiness is an important model feature; without price stickiness, we are in the real business cycle economies that Cooley and Hansen studied. But, it raises further questions. For instance, is price stickiness of the Calvo form—the one used here—necessary to explain the phase shift?


2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (4) ◽  
pp. 110-141
Author(s):  
Henrique S. Basso ◽  
Omar Rachedi

We document that government spending multipliers depend on the population age structure. Using the variation in military spending and birth rates across US states, we show that the local fiscal multiplier is 1.5 and increases with the population share of young people, implying multipliers of 1.1–1.9 in the interquartile range. A parsimonious life cycle open economy New Keynesian model with credit market imperfections and age-specific differences in labor supply and demand explains 87 percent of the relationship between local multipliers and demographics. The model implies that the US population aging between 1980 and 2015 caused a 38 percent drop in national government spending multipliers. (JEL D15, E12, E24, E62, J11, J22, J23)


2020 ◽  
Vol 0 (0) ◽  
Author(s):  
Marcin Kolasa

AbstractThis paper studies how macroprudential policy tools applied to the housing market can complement the interest rate-based monetary policy in achieving one additional stabilization objective, defined as keeping either economic activity or credit at some exogenous (and possibly time-varying) levels. We show analytically in a canonical New Keynesian model with housing and collateral constraints that using the loan-to-value (LTV) ratio, tax on credit or tax on property as additional policy instruments does not resolve the inflation-output volatility tradeoff. Perfect targeting of inflation and credit with monetary and macroprudential policy is possible only if the role of housing debt in the economy is sufficiently small. The identified limits to the considered policies are related to their predominantly intertemporal impact on decisions made by financially constrained agents, making them poor complements to monetary policy, which also operates at an intertemporal margin. These limits can be overcome if macroprudential policy is instead designed such that it sufficiently redistributes income between savers and borrowers.


Mathematics ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 9 (10) ◽  
pp. 1098
Author(s):  
Keiichi Morimoto

Using a simple model of a coordination game, this paper explores how the information use of individuals affects an optimal committee size. Although enlarging the committee promotes information aggregation, it also stimulates the members’ coordination motive and distorts their voting behavior through higher-order beliefs. On the determination of a finite optimal committee size, the direction and degree of strategic interactions matter. When the strategic complementarity among members is strong, a finite optimal committee size exists. In contrast, it does not exist under strategic substitution. This mechanism is applied to the design of monetary policy committees in a New Keynesian model in which a committee conducts monetary policy under imperfect information.


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