Optimal Macroeconomic Policy in General Equilibrium Models

宏观经济学中的一个基本问题是，无论是在平均水平上还是在应对商业周期冲击的情况下，应该如何制定财政和货币政策。这个问题在商业波动的定量、一般均衡模型中得到了解决。该项目研究了技术和政府消费受到冲击的模型、名义工资收缩模型和具有异质代理人的模型。还分析了政府不能承诺其未来政策的模型。这些模型中的最优政策为财政和货币政策应如何在整个商业周期中实施提供了量化指导。例如，结果将表明，在经济衰退期间，政府赤字应该有多大，以及货币政策的刺激性应该有多大。经济增长率在很大程度上受到新技术采用率和旧技术替代率的影响。通常，一项新技术的问世与其广泛使用之间存在很长的滞后时间。这种现象被称为扩散。这个项目考察了决定技术扩散速度的一些主要因素。这项研究提供了对决定增长、新技术的传播和旧技术的衰落的更深层次的理解。此外，还研究了货币传导机制模型的性质。该项目的这一部分应该会提高我们对货币冲击的利率、产出和就业影响的关键特征的理解。

A fundamental question in macroeconomics is how should fiscal and monetary policy be set, both on average, and in response to business cycle shocks. This question is addressed in quantitative, general equilibrium models of business fluctuations. This project studies models with shocks to technology and government consumption, models of nominal wage contracting and models with heterogeneous agents. Models are also analyzed in which the government cannot commit to its future policies. The optimal policies in these models provide quantitative guidance on how fiscal and monetary policy should be conducted over the business cycle. For example, the results will indicate how big the government deficit should be and how stimulative monetary policy should be in a recession. Economic growth rates are substantially affected by the rate of adoption of new technologies and the rate of displacement of old ones. Typically, there is a long lag between the availability of a new technology and the time when its use becomes widespread. This phenomenon is known as diffusion. This project examines some of the principal factors determining the rates of diffusion of technology. The research provides a deeper understanding of the forces determining growth, the diffusion of new technologies and the decay of old ones. The properties of models of the monetary transmission mechanism are also investigated. This part of the project should improve our understanding of the key features of the interest rate, output and employment effects of monetary shocks.