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Author: Mr.Howell H. Zee
Publisher: International Monetary Fund
ISBN: 1451853440
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 22
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Book Description
This paper provides general equilibrium estimates of the steady-state welfare gains of lowering inflation from a low level to close to price stability, using an overlapping-generations growth model. Money demand is modeled on the basis that real money balances are a factor of production. Assuming a standard Fisher equation modified by the presence of an income tax, it is found that inflation unambiguously reduces capital intensity, drives up the before-tax real rate of return to capital, and unambiguously imposes a life-time welfare cost. This welfare cost is, however, quantitatively very modest (under 0.2 percent of GDP annually) within reasonable ranges of all parameter values.
Author: Mr.Howell H. Zee
Publisher: International Monetary Fund
ISBN: 1451853440
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 22
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Book Description
This paper provides general equilibrium estimates of the steady-state welfare gains of lowering inflation from a low level to close to price stability, using an overlapping-generations growth model. Money demand is modeled on the basis that real money balances are a factor of production. Assuming a standard Fisher equation modified by the presence of an income tax, it is found that inflation unambiguously reduces capital intensity, drives up the before-tax real rate of return to capital, and unambiguously imposes a life-time welfare cost. This welfare cost is, however, quantitatively very modest (under 0.2 percent of GDP annually) within reasonable ranges of all parameter values.
Author: Mr.Etienne B. Yehoue
Publisher: International Monetary Fund
ISBN: 147550537X
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 36
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Book Description
The financial crisis in the advanced countries that began in 2007 has led central bankers to adopt unconventional policy measures as policy interest rates neared the zero bound. One suggestion (Blanchard, Dell’Ariccia, and Mauro, 2010) has been to raise inflation targets to provide more room for policy rate easing during crises. This paper addresses a different issue: the relationship between inflation and welfare. The literature is surveyed and a model is developed. A key conclusion is that an increase in inflation targets gives rise to additional welfare costs, even after the extra room to maneuver above the zero lower bound for nominal policy rates is taken into account. Based on parameter values that fit U.S. data, the additional welfare costs of raising inflation targets from 2 to 4 percent are estimated at about 0.3 percent of annual real income. A rise to 10 percent would yield additional welfare costs of about 1 percent of real income. Other parameter values yield welfare costs as high as 7 (respectively 30) percent of real income for raising inflation targets from 2 to 4 (respectively from 2 to 10) percent. The full costs of raising inflation targets are likely to be higher because the model used to generate these estimates does not account for higher inflation-induced volatility.
Author: Mr.Jose De Gregorio
Publisher: International Monetary Fund
ISBN: 145193128X
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 34
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Book Description
This paper examines the welfare effects of mitigating the costs of inflation. In a simple model where money reduces transaction costs, a fall in the costs of inflation is equivalent to financial innovation. This can be caused by paying interest on deposits, indexing money, or “dollarizing.” Results indicate that financial innovation raises welfare in low inflation economies while reducing it in high inflation economies, due to the offsetting indirect effect of higher inflation to finance the budget.
Author: Robert E. Lucas (Jr)
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Inflation (Finance)
Languages : en
Pages : 54
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Book Description
Author: Martin Feldstein
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 0226241769
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 374
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Book Description
In recent years, the Federal Reserve and central banks worldwide have enjoyed remarkable success in their battle against inflation. The challenge now confronting the Fed and its counterparts is how to proceed in this newly benign economic environment: Should monetary policy seek to maintain a rate of low-level inflation or eliminate inflation altogether in an effort to attain full price stability? In a seminal article published in 1997, Martin Feldstein developed a framework for calculating the gains in economic welfare that might result from a move from a low level of inflation to full price stability. The present volume extends that analysis, focusing on the likely costs and benefits of achieving price stability not only in the United States, but in Germany, Spain, and the United Kingdom as well. The results show that even small changes in already low inflation rates can have a substantial impact on the economic performance of different countries, and that variations in national tax rules can affect the level of gain from disinflation.
Author:
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :
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Book Description
The authors study the welfare cost of inflation in a general equilibrium life-cycle model that includes households that live for many periods, production and capital, simple monetary and financial sectors, and a fairly elaborate government sector. The government's taxation of capital income is not indexed for inflation. They find that a plausibly calibrated version of this model has a steady state that matches a variety of facts about the postwar U.S. economy. They use the model to estimate the welfare cost of permanent, policy-induced changes in the inflation rate and find that most of the costs of inflation are direct and indirect consequences of the fact that inflation increases the effective tax rate on capital income. The cost estimates are an order of magnitude larger that other estimates in the literature.
Author: Clark A. Burdick
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Inflation (Finance)
Languages : en
Pages : 56
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Book Description
Author: Martin S. Feldstein
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Phillips curve
Languages : en
Pages : 32
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Book Description
Author: Christina D. Romer
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 0226724832
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 434
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Book Description
While there is ample evidence that high inflation is harmful, little is known about how best to reduce inflation or how far it should be reduced. In this volume, sixteen distinguished economists analyze the appropriateness of low inflation as a goal for monetary policy and discuss possible strategies for reducing inflation. Section I discusses the consequences of inflation. These papers analyze inflation's impact on the tax system, labor market flexibility, equilibrium unemployment, and the public's sense of well-being. Section II considers the obstacles facing central bankers in achieving low inflation. These papers study the precision of estimates of equilibrium unemployment, the sources of the high inflation of the 1970s, and the use of non-traditional indicators in policy formation. The papers in section III consider how institutions can be designed to promote successful monetary policy, and the importance of institutions to the performance of policy in the United States, Germany, and other countries. This timely volume should be read by anyone who studies or conducts monetary policy.
Author: David E. Altig
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 0521848504
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 352
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Book Description
The essays in this volume investigate the challenges of transitioning to lower levels of inflation and conducting monetary policy in low-inflation economies. The essays make both theoretical and empirical contributions.
