The Inflation Bias Hypothesis and Monetary Policy in the Open Economy

作者建议进行研究，以帮助确定在封闭和开放经济环境下改善货币政策的方法。第一个项目将探索关于市场经济经历长期低通胀和高通胀的原因的一个假设。通胀偏向假说表明，代价高昂的高通胀周期反映了货币机构设计上的弱点，因为它们没有赋予货币政策制定者可信地承诺持续的低通胀政策的能力。为了检验通货膨胀偏向假说，作者建议将通货膨胀的各种成本和收益纳入缺乏承诺技术的优化货币当局的一般均衡模型中。使用一般均衡模型的优势在于，它们涉及范围广泛的数据。通过这种方式，可以在模型的设计和建造中使用大量信息，而不仅仅是关于通胀和产出的数据。作者认为，如果所得到的模型能够解释观察到的通胀水平和波动性，那么我们应该对通胀偏向假说更有信心，因为它暗示着货币政策的改善需要重新设计货币制度以纳入更大的承诺。作者在分析两个传统的一般均衡模型的基础上报告了一些初步结果。他发现，这些模型并不支持通胀偏向假说，而且它们暗示，货币机构的重新设计不会带来什么好处。然而，他也报告称，这些模型对货币需求的影响不佳。此外，他还指出，当模型的中介技术被引入以改善其货币需求含义时，通胀偏向假说就会复活。在此基础上，作者建议在中介技术的建模方面开展更多的工作，以便对通胀偏向假说进行可信的评估。令人信服的检验还要求该模型在考虑更广泛的变量方面做得很好。因此，作者计划对现有模型进行扩展，以便将资本积累和政府财政变量(如债务和税收)纳入其中。作者预计，这项研究将有助于揭示其他问题，包括实证货币需求文献中的各种谜题，以及恶性通货膨胀时期令人费解的特征。第二个项目将有助于揭示一些新兴市场经济体经历的金融危机的原因和补救措施。作者试图通过分析强调企业在国外和国内营运资本要求的模型来获得对这些经验的新见解。他建议进行研究，以帮助人们了解危机发生后应立即采取的适当货币政策。他提出的初步结果表明，“危机”时期货币传导机制的性质可能与“正常”时期截然不同。作者还建议研究包括美元化在内的替代货币制度，看看哪种制度最有可能产生良好的结果。在这项工作中，他计划考虑影响特定新兴市场经济体的各种冲击，包括对预期的冲击。拟议的研究将涉及构建小型开放经济体的量化一般均衡模型。这些模型的构建和参数确定将以个别国家的经验分析为指导。这项研究还需要对危机发生后发生的情况进行实证调查，包括分析当时可能施加的附带限制的类型。此外还有两个项目。人们可以利用量化的一般均衡模型，探讨最近人们对低名义利率所带来的所谓危险的担忧。另一种是研究在一个拥有大量不同年龄和生产率的公司的经济体中的货币传导。

The author proposes research to help identify ways of improving monetary policy in both closed and open economy settings. The first project would explore one hypothesis about the reasons market economies undergo prolonged periods of low and high inflation. The inflation bias hypoth-esis suggests that the periodic episodes of costly high inflation reflect a weakness in the design of monetary institutions in that they do not confer monetary policy makers with the ability to cred-ibly commit to consistently low inflation policies. To test the inflation bias hypothesis, the author proposes to incorporate the various costs and benefits of inflation into general equilibrium models with an optimizing monetary authority which lacks a commitment technology. The advantage of using general equilibrium models is that they have implications for a wide array of data. In this way a large amount of information, not just data on inflation and output, can be brought to bear in the models' design and construction. The author argues that if the resulting model can account for the observed level and volatility of inflation, then we should have greater confidence in the inflation bias hypothesis and in its implication that improvements in monetary policy require redesigning monetary institutions to incorporate greater commitment.The author reports some initial results based on analyzing two conventional general equi-librium models. He finds that these models do not support the inflation bias hypothesis, and that they imply there is little to be gained in the redesign of monetary institutions. However he also reports that the models' implications for money demand are poor. Moreover, he shows that when changes in the models' intermediation technologies are introduced to improve their money demand implications, then the inflation bias hypothesis is resuscitated. On this basis, the author proposes to undertake additional work on the modeling of intermediation technologies in order to develop a credible evaluation of the inflation bias hypothesis. A convincing test also requires that the model do well in accounting for a broader set of variables. Accordingly, the author plans to extend existing models so that they incorporate capital accumulation and government fiscal variables such as debt and taxes. The author expects that the research will help shed light on other issues including various puzzles in the empirical money demand literature and puzzling features of hyperinflation episodes.The second project would help shed light on the causes and remedies for financial crises experienced by a number of emerging market economies. The author seeks to gain new insights into these experiences by analyzing models which emphasize the foreign and domestic working capital requirements of firms. He proposes research designed to help shed light on the ap-propriate monetary policy to follow in the immediate aftermath of a crisis. He presents preliminary results which suggest that the nature of the monetary transmission mechanism in 'crisis' times may be very different than what it is in 'normal' times. The author also proposes to study alterna-tive monetary regimes, including dollarization, to see which is most likely to produce good results. In this work, he plans to take into account the various shocks affecting particular emerging market economies, including shocks to expectations. The proposed research would involve constructing quantitative general equilibrium models of small open economies. The construction and parameter-ization of these models would be guided by empirical analysis of individual countries. The research also entails an empirical investigation of what happens in the aftermath of a crisis, including the analysis of the type of collateral constraints that may be imposed at that time.There are two additional projects. One would explore, with the use of quantitative general equilibrium models, recent concerns that have been raised about the supposed dangers of low nominal rates of interest. Another would investigate the monetary transmission in an economy with a large number of firms of different ages and productivity.