Rocheteau, Rupert, and Wright [Scandinavian Journal of Economics 109 (2007), 837–855] show that the relationship between inflation and unemployment can be positive or negative, depending on the primitives of the model. The key features are indivisible labor, nonseparable preferences, and bargaining. Their results are derived only for a special case of bargaining, take-it-or-leave-it offer by buyers. Instead of bargaining, this paper considers competitive search. I show that the results of Rocheteau et al. can be generalized to an environment where both buyers and sellers have nonseparable preferences. In addition, the relationship between inflation and unemployment is robust to allowing free entry by sellers, which cannot be studied in Rocheteau et al. (2007).

Trade in intermediate goods is an important feature of trade in developed small open economies. We show that a model that assumes trade in intermediate goods brings the dynamics of an otherwise standard small open economy closer to what is observed in the data. With trade in intermediate goods, movements of international relative prices affect the economy through an additional channel, denoted the “cost channel.” A model embedding this channel comes closer to business cycle data in several dimensions compared to models with trade in final goods only. It increases the share of output variance explained by foreign shocks, lowers the exchange rate pass-through, and delivers a positive international correlation of outputs. In addition, the matching of other business cycle moments is at least as good as in a model with trade in final goods only.

This paper proposes the use of wavelet methods to estimate U.S. core inflation. It explains wavelet methods and suggests that they are ideally suited to this task. Comparisons are made with traditional Consumer Price Index–based and regression-based measures for their performance in following trend inflation and predicting future inflation. Results suggest that wavelet-based measures perform better, and sometimes much better, than the traditional approaches. These results suggest that wavelet methods are a promising avenue for future research on core inflation.

Daily financial returns (and daily stock returns, in particular) are commonly modeled as GARCH(1, 1) processes. Here we test this specification using new model evaluation technology developed by Ashley and Patterson that examines the ability of the estimated model to reproduce features of particular interest: various aspects of nonlinear serial dependence, in the present instance. Using daily returns to the CRSP equally weighted stock index, we find that the GARCH(1, 1) specification cannot be rejected; thus, this model appears to be reasonably adequate in terms of reproducing the kinds of nonlinear serial dependence addressed by the battery of nonlinearity tests used here.

We study a dynamic equilibrium model in which agents have adaptive expectations and monetary authorities pursue an inflation target. We show how alternative monetary stabilization policies become more effective when fiscal constraints on deficits are implemented, although they are not binding at the equilibrium target. In particular, we show that the inflation target equilibrium can be locally, or even globally, stable for a large class of adaptive learning schemes. We also compare alternative stabilization policies in terms of their stability properties. Commonly postulated conditional Taylor-type rules tend to be dominated by other rules, such as an unconditional Friedman type.

We compare two stylized frameworks for the implementation of monetary policy. The first framework relies only on standing facilities, whereas the second framework relies only on open-market operations. We show that the Friedman rule cannot be implemented when the central bank uses standing facilities only. For a given rate of inflation, we show that standing facilities unambiguously achieve higher welfare than just conducting open-market operations. We conclude that elements of both frameworks should be combined. Also, our results suggest that any monetary policy implementation framework should remunerate both required and excess reserves.

The DICE (for Dynamic Integrated model of Climate and the Economy) introduced two important policy aspects to the economic discussion of global warming. First, it argues for a “climate-policy ramp” that deems back-loading of mitigation optimal. Second, it demonstrates that an intergenerational tradeoff is at the heart of the mitigation problem. In this paper we argue that both of these findings rest on contestable assumptions. To demonstrate this a recast DICE is presented. Its outcomes show that DICE's predictions are not robust with higher migitations earlier on and slower temperature increases along the optimal path. The adoption of a baseline scenario in which pollution is a negative externality makes mitigating climate change a Pareto improvement. The alleged sacrifice of present generations vanishes. This strengthens the case for immediate policy action.

We introduce increasing returns to scale into an otherwise standard New Keynesian model with capital, and study the determinacy and E-stability of equilibrium under Taylor-type interest rate rules. With very mild increasing returns supported by empirical research, the conventional wisdom regarding the design of interest rate rules can be overturned. In particular, the “Taylor principle” no longer guarantees either determinacy or E-stability of the rational expectations equilibrium.

This paper focuses on the possibility that financial markets require risk premia on holding sovereign debt of countries that appear vulnerable from a fiscal sustainability perspective. Both the level of debt as well as the rate of change of debt are assumed to impact on the risk premium. We analyze the impact of such an endogenous risk premium in a simple debt game between a monetary and a fiscal player, as introduced by [Tabellini (1986) Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control 10, 427–442]. The risk premium term adds a nonlinearity to the linear model in case risk premia are absent. We analyze outcomes in case of noncooperative open-loop Nash strategies and in case of cooperative strategies and consider the workings of the risk premium as a market-based disciplining device (in case of high debt) and adjustment rewarding device (in case of a declining debt trajectory).

Yes, indeed; at least for macroeconomic policy interaction. We examine a Neo-Classical economy and provide the conditions for policy arrangements to successfully stabilize the economy when agents have either rational or adaptive expectations. For a contemporaneous-data monetary policy rule, the monetarist solution is unique and stationary under a passive fiscal/active monetary policy regime if monetary policy appropriately incorporates expectational heterogeneity. In contrast, the active fiscal/passive monetary policy regime's fiscalist solution is prone to explosiveness due to empirically plausible expectational heterogeneity. Nevertheless, this can be a well-defined, rather orthodox equilibrium. For operational monetary policy rules, only the results for the fiscalist solution prevail. Moreover, our results are plausible from an adaptive learning viewpoint.

First generation immigrants to the United States have higher fertility rates than natives. This paper analyzes to what extent this factor provides political support for immigration, using an overlapping generation model with production and capital accumulation. In this setting, immigration represents a dynamic trade-off for native workers as more immigrants decrease current wages but increase the future return on their savings. We find that immigrant fertility has surprisingly strong effects on voter incentives, especially when there is persistence in the political process. If fertility rates are sufficiently high, native workers support immigration. Persistence, either due to inertia induced by frictions in the legal system or through expectational linkages, significantly magnifies the effects. Entry of immigrants with high fertility has redistributive impacts across generations similar to pay-as-you-go social security: initial generations are net winners, whereas later generations are net losers.

The presumption that R&D is a key driver of economic growth is difficult to reconcile with empirical evidence. For example, in most studies, which identify technical change with total factor productivity (TFP), the link between TFP and measures of knowledge is found to be weak.

This paper shows that a reconciliation may be possible in a model where R&D contributes to growth through investment-specific technical change. Such a model predicts that the empirical link between knowledge and productivty would be weak even if the generation of knowledge is the predominant factor of economic growth. The paper also shows that estimates of the production function for knowledge using patent data may be biased.

The traditional economic approach to index number theory is based on a ratio of cost functions. Diewert defined superlative price and quantity indices as observable indices that were exact for a ratio of unit cost functions or for a ratio of linearly homogeneous utility functions. The present paper looks for counterparts to his results in the difference context, for both flexible homothetic and flexible nonhomothetic preferences. The Bennet indicators of price and quantity change turn out to be superlative for the nonhomothetic case. The underlying preferences are of the translation-homothetic form discussed by Balk, Chambers, Dickenson, Färe, and Grosskopf.

We construct a multiple-shock, discrete-time version of the Mortensen–Pissarides labor market search model to investigate the basic model's well-known tendency to underpredict the volatility of key labor market variables. In addition to the standard labor productivity shock, we introduce shocks to matching efficiency and job separation. We estimate the multiple-shock model and then simulate its properties. Although it generates significantly more volatility while preserving the Beveridge curve relationship, the multiple-shock model generates counterfactual implications for the cyclicality of job separations. Using a business cycle accounting approach, next we show that the model requires significantly procyclical and volatile matching efficiency and counterfactually procyclical job separations to render the observed data without error. We conjecture that the basic Mortensen–Pissarides model lacks mechanisms to generate sufficiently strong labor market reallocation over the business cycle, and suggest nontrivial labor force participation and job-to-job transitions as promising avenues of research.

This paper tests for output convergence across n = 51 economies, employing the definition of Pesaran [Journal of Econometrics 138, 312–355 (2007)]. The definition requires output gaps to be stationary around a constant mean. But when all n(n − 1)/2 pairs of log per capita output gaps are considered, this results in more than 1,000 unit root tests to be conducted. Hence, because of the ensuing multiplicity of the testing problem, a nontrivial number of output gaps will be falsely declared to be stationary when each of the n(n − 1)/2 hypotheses is tested at some conventional level like 5%. To solve the problem, we employ recent multiple testing techniques that allow us to bound the expected fraction of false rejections at a desired level. Monte Carlo results illustrate the usefulness of the techniques. The empirical results show that the data do not support the notion of output convergence after controlling for multiplicity.

The aim of this research is to build on a theory for explaining economic development in a (neoclassical) growth model with endogenous fertility. The economy is inhabited by overlapping generations of rational and identical individuals and identical competitive firms producing with a constant-returns-to-scale technology and no externalities. From a theoretical perspective, the distinguishing feature of this work is that endogenous fertility per se explains the existence of low- and high-development regimes. It provides different reasons (history driven or expectations driven) why some countries enter development trajectories with high GDP and low fertility and others experience underperformances with low GDP and high fertility. The model is also capable to reproduce fertility fluctuations and explain the baby busts and baby booms observed in the last century in some developed countries.

The energy transition from fossil fuels to alternative energy sources has important consequences for technological change and resource extraction. We examine these consequences by incorporating a nonrenewable resource and an alternative energy source in a market economy model of endogenous growth through expanding varieties. During the energy transition, technological progress is nonmonotonic over time: It declines initially, starts increasing when the economy approaches the regime shift, and jumps down once the resource stock is exhausted. A moment of peak-oil does no longer necessarily occur, and simultaneous use of the resource and the alternative energy source will take place if the return to innovation becomes too low. Subsidies to research and development (R&D) and to renewables production speed up the energy transition, whereas a tax on fossil fuels postpones the switch to renewable energy.

We analyze in some detail the full predeposit game in a simple, tractable, yet very rich, banking environment. How does run-risk affect the optimal deposit contract? If there is a run equilibrium in the postdeposit game, then the optimal contract in the predeposit game tolerates small-probability runs. However, this does not mean that small changes in run-risk are ignored. In some cases, the optimal contract becomes—as one would expect—strictly more conservative as the run-probability increases (until it switches to the best run-proof contract), and the equilibrium allocation is not a mere randomization over the equilibrium allocations from the postdeposit game. In other cases, the allocation is a mere randomization over the equilibria from the postdeposit game. In the first cases (the more intuitive cases), the incentive constraint does not bind. In the second cases, the incentive constraint does bind.

Since the 1970s, the characteristics of international business cycles have changed, and deeper economic integration has modified the features of cross-country comovement. We formally test for correlation shifts in measures of real economic activity and economic/financial integration. In Europe we find some statistically significant evidence of higher correlations for several subgroups of countries following the creation of the EMU in 1999. We detect significantly more pronounced correlations between Mexico and the United States and between Mexico and Canada in North America after the enforcement of the NAFTA in 1994. Results are derived from an econometric framework based on nonparametric iterated stationary bootstrap methods, whose statistical reliability and performance we assess through Monte Carlo simulations.

This paper proposes an alternative measure for the slack of the aggregate labor market. The natural rate of hours holds valuable information about the state of the labor market that is not reflected by conventional measures, such as the equilibrium rate of unemployment, because it takes the intensive margin into account and is robust to variations in labor force participation. We set up and estimate a multivariate unobserved-components model using information on GDP, inflation, and hours worked, and apply it to the United States and Germany. The estimated hours gap outperforms conventional unemployment gap measures in a Taylor rule by formal model comparison.