An International Comparative Research on the Inflation Targeting Policy ; Whether It Is Valid under the Deflation?

通货膨胀目标制已被世界上许多国家采用。虽然它在日本被提倡为一种针对通货紧缩的特殊政策操作，但它在现实中与世界货币政策操作的标准接近。本研究项目旨在研究各国通货膨胀目标制政策的经验，并考察其在日本的适用性。以下是我们的主要发现。1)各国通货膨胀目标制的设计虽有差异，但经过十多年的实践，通货膨胀目标制作为货币政策操作的“灵活框架”已形成共同趋势。典型的例子是新西兰，最初引入的是严格的规则和会计制度，但最近的改革将其转变为“灵活框架”。其他国家也大都朝着同样的方向发展，学术研究也基本支持这一趋势。通货膨胀目标制国家扩大了政策信息披露的限制。在这一点上，没有出现逆转的趋势。目前的领跑者展示了他们的主要经济模型，并在整个决策过程中实施“同行评审”。这一趋势得到了理论研究的支持，泰国等发展中国家也遵循了这一趋势。欧洲中央银行在这方面受到特别的限制，因为它的决策机构包括来自不同国家的代表。3)瑞典的货币政策操作经常被认为是大萧条时期对抗通货紧缩的罕见成功案例。然而，在其采用价格水平目标之后不久，又采取了与英镑挂钩的政策。因此，应更仔细地重新审查其价格水平目标的一致性和有效性。4)研究项目的实证部分表明，传统的数量指标M2+CD在20世纪90年代末失去了对经济预测的信息量，并分析了其原因。理论部分表明，通货膨胀目标制国家普遍存在的委员会决策可能导致过于谨慎的决策，利率控制是通货膨胀目标制的有效工具。少

The inflation targeting has been adapted by the many countries over the world. Though it was advocated as a special policy operation against the deflation in Japan, it is close to the world standard of the monetary policy operation in reality. This research project aims to research on the experiences of the inflation targeting policy in countries and to examine its applicability onto Japan. The followings are our major findings.1)There have been variations in the design of the inflation targeting among the countries but, after a decade of experiences, the common trend has emerged towards the inflation targeting as the "flexible framework" for the monetary policy operation. The typical example is New Zealand, where the rigid rules and accounting system were introduced initially but the recent reform changed it towards the "flexible framework". Other countries are mostly in the same direction and the academic researches basically support that trend.2)The inflation-targeting countries hav … More e expanded the limit in the policy information disclosure. In this point, there has been no reverse trend. The current frontrunners exhibit their main economic models and implement the "peer review" of the total policy-making process. This trend is supported by the theoretical works and is followed by the developing countries like Thailand. The European Central Bank is exceptionally restricted in this regard, since its policy making body includes the representatives from the different countries.3)The Swedish monetary policy operation is often mentioned as the rare success example against the deflation in the Great Depression era. However, its adoption of the priceKievel target is followed shortly after by the adoption of the British-Pound peg policy. Thus, the consistency and the validity of its price-level targeting should be re-examined more carefully.4)The empirical part of the research project showed that the traditional quantity indicator, M2+CD lost its information content for economic forecasts in the late 1990s, and examined its causes. The theoretical parts showed that the policy-making by the committee, which is common among the inflation-targeting countries, might leads to the excessively cautious decisions, and that the interest-rate control is a valid tool in the inflation targeting. Less