A Frictionless View of U.S. Inflation
A Frictionless View of U.S. Inflation
复制标题
美国通胀的无摩擦视角
DOI：
10.1086/ma.13.4623752
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发表时间：
1998
影响因子：
7.7
通讯作者：
J. Cochrane
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
J. Cochrane
金融创新挑战了货币理论的基础，而标准货币理论在描述美国通货膨胀的历史方面并不成功。受这些观察的启发，我问：我们能用一个忽略货币摩擦的框架来理解美国通胀的历史吗？价格水平的财政理论允许我们考虑没有货币摩擦的价格水平决定。根据这一方法，价格水平调整以平衡名义政府债务的真实的价值和盈余的现值。我描述了这个理论，我认为这是对前数量理论思想的回归，在这种思想中，货币是通过商品标准来估价的，或者是因为政府接受它来纳税。这两种价值来源都不受金融创新和货币摩擦存在与否的影响。然后，我用财政理论的无摩擦观点解释了美国通货膨胀的历史。我展示了财政理论如何能够适应这样一个程式化的事实，即赤字和通货膨胀似乎是负相关的，而不是正相关的。我验证了它的预测，即公开市场操作不影响通货膨胀。我将展示债务政策如何已经大大缓解了通胀。
Financial innovation challenges the foundations of monetary theory, and standard monetary theory has not been very successful at describing the history of U.S. inflation. Motivated by these observations, I ask: Can we understand the history of U.S. inflation using a framework that ignores monetary frictions? The fiscal theory of the price level allows us to think about price-level determination with no monetary frictions. According to this approach, the price level adjusts to equilibrate the real value of nominal government debt with the present value of surpluses. I describe the theory, and I argue that it is a return to pre-quantity-theoretic ideas in which money is valued via a commodity standard or because the government accepts it to pay taxes. Both sources of value are immune to financial innovation and the presence or absence of monetary frictions. I then interpret the history of U.S. inflation with a fiscal-theory, frictionless view. I show how the fiscal theory can accommodate the stylized fact that deficits and inflation seem to be negatively, not positively correlated. I verify its prediction that open-market operations do not affect inflation. I show how debt policy has already smoothed inflation a great deal.