Category Macro
Forward guidance and the term structure in New Keynesian models
Take a standard New Keynesian macroeconomic model, where the central bank sets the one-period interest rate. Now let's hit it with an unexpected shock. For simplicity and concreteness, let the shock be a reduction in government spending that will last for n periods, after which government spending will return to normal. So government spending was […]
Policy rules and borrowing degrees of freedom.
In the olden days, as Peter Dorman notes, macro models would contain variables like M (or r), G, and T (or t) for monetary and fiscal policy. Nowadays they usually contain a monetary policy rule, and sometimes a fiscal policy rule too. Like a Taylor Rule, for example. [Update: but see my old post on […]
Private debt, public debt, and continuity
Let me try it this way. Here's Brad DeLong: "So, by continuity, somewhere between policies of austerity that that produce deflationary depression due to an excess demand for safe assets and policies of fiscal license that produce inflationary boom caused by an excess supply of government debt, there must be a sweet spot: enough new […]
Twin debt equilibria, and waiting for the sunspot
Paul Krugman, responding to Simon Wren-Lewis, wants a model to better articulate Ken Rogoff's fears of debt and deficits (pdf). Fair enough request. I can't give Paul a fully worked-out formal model, but I think I can give him a sketch of what such a model would look like. (Update: If Paul likes, he could […]
Two Neo-Wicksellian indeterminacies
To misquote Milton Friedman: macroeconomics has only regressed one derivative since Wicksell. The old Wicksellian indeterminacy has long been known: the equilibrium price level is indeterminate if the central bank sets an interest rate. The neo-Wicksellian/New Keynesian model has two indeterminacies. I've been worrying about the indeterminacy of the level of output; John Cochrane has […]
Interest rates and Aggregate Demand
What happened in 2008? Why didn't the cut in interest rates prevent Aggregate Demand from falling? Was it just that the cut in interest rates wasn't big enough? Or is the rate of interest the wrong thing to look at? Because it's only a relative price, and relative prices only matter for relative demand? Suppose […]
Bertrand, Cournot, and the Simple Money Game
I'm writing this post mostly to try to get my own head straight. Read at your own risk. Strategy space matters. The order of moves matters. What I call "the Simple Money Game" is a three-stage mixed Bertrand-Cournot general equilibrium game. Bertrand moves are made before Cournot moves. Each player is both a producer of […]
Thoughts on teaching “The Time Value of Money”
Strangely, because I've always been a macro/money guy, and have been teaching economics for 30+ years, I'm currently teaching the intermediate-level "Monetary and Financial Institutions" (aka "Money and Banking") course for the first time ever. (20 years ago I did teach a crash course in Finance to Marxist-trained Cubans, which was fun, and forced me […]
New Keynesians just assume full employment without even realising it
And anyone with even an ounce of Old Keynesian blood left in his veins, if they understood what the New Keynesians are doing, would be screaming blue murder that we are teaching this New Keynesian model to our students as the main macro model, and that central banks are using this model to set monetary […]
Old and New Keynesians and self-equilibration
As I have argued before: "Does the macroeconomy self-equilibrate?" is a stupid question, because the answer depends on the monetary policy being followed. Your answer also depends on your model of the economy. And that's what I want to look at here. "Compare and contrast Old Keynesian and New Keynesian views on whether the economy […]
Worthwhile Canadian Initiative 
Recent Comments