Information Asymmetry and Inequalities in Macroeconomics

信息在决定个人选择方面起着根本性的作用：虽然每个行动都取决于可用的信息，但尽管存在一个共同的世界状态，但这在个人之间可能是异质的。当信息不对称不仅在相似的个人之间，而且在不同的群体之间（相同“类型”的相似个人），谁知道什么不仅在个人层面上重要，而且还可以通过改变总消费和储蓄行为来影响整个经济，因此信息不平等“对宏观经济学很重要”。在这个项目中，我探索了关于经济未来动态的信息不对称如何在经济均衡中持续存在，即使经济主体是完全理性的，并且可以观察到所有的价格，从而放大甚至产生商业周期的影响。其贡献在于，确立了一种新的商业周期产生和放大机制，这种机制依赖于信息差异，而非行为假设。此外，我还讨论了考虑政策干预的信念-协调机制对传统和非常规政策制定的影响。事实上，这种机制的含义是多方面的。商业周期受到了非同一般的影响，因为代理人对当前价格如何反映世界基本状况的理解能力减弱了。首先，这会影响到事后和可观察到的不平等的各个方面（例如财富和教育选择）。其次，它造成了财政和货币政策干预的两难境地：如果“宣布”会导致不同个体因事前信息不同而产生不协调的反应，那么披露政策制定者的私人信息是否最优？当考虑到“更简单”的政策工具在所有主体中确定相似信念的能力（从而协调反应）时，它们可能比表面上“最优”的政策工具更有效。第三，当信息异质性“影响宏观”时，个人信息获取选择导致经济外部性。当这种情况发生时，计划者/决策者应该通过内部化由个人最优但潜在的社会次优信息获取选择引起的外部性来解决这个问题。

Information has a fundamental role in determining individual choices: while each action is made conditional on the available information, this is potentially heterogeneous across individuals despite the existence of a common state of the world. When information is asymmetric non only across similar individuals, but also across different groups (similar individuals of the same "type"), who knows what matters not only at individual level, but can also affect the economy as a whole by modifying the aggregate consumption and saving behaviour, so that information inequalities "matters for macroeconomics".In this project, I explore how information asymmetries about the future dynamics of the economy can persist in equilibrium even when agents are fully rational and can observe all prices, amplifying the effects of the business cycle or even generating it. The contribution is to pin down a new mechanism of business cycle generation and amplification relying on information differentials but not on behavioural assumptions. Furthermore, I address the implications for conventional and unconventional policy-making arising from considering the beliefs-coordination mechanism of policy intervention.In fact, the implications of this mechanism are multifold. The business cycle is affected in non-trivial ways as agents are less able to understand how current prices reflect the underlying state of the world. First, this can affect various dimensions of ex-post and observable inequalities (e.g. wealth and education choices). Second, it creates a dilemma regarding the fiscal and monetary policy intervention: is revealing private information of the policy-maker optimal if "announcing" can lead to uncoordinated reactions across different individuals due to their different ex-ante information? "Simpler" policy instruments may be more effective than the apparently "optimal" ones when their ability to pin down similar beliefs across all agents - and thus coordinated reactions - is considered. Third, when information heterogeneity "matters for macro", individual information-acquisition choices lead to economic externalities. When this happens, the planner/policy-maker should address the issue by internalizing the externalities induced by individually optimal but potentially socially sub-optimal information acquisition choices.