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This thesis estimates the effects of monetary policy shocks by employing vector auto regressions (VAR). I argue that to the extent the central bank and the private sector have information not reflected in the VAR, the measurement of policy innovations is contaminated. These incorrectly estimated policy shocks then generate misleading results about the effects of monetary policy. This thesis first attempts to figure out the variables indeed observed by central banks to make monetary policy decisions and then formulates the monetary policy reaction function by using those variables. Having identified more realistic monetary policy functions in VAR models, I conclude that most of the previous puzzling results about the effect of monetary policy shocks might be due to incorrectly identifying the monetary policy reaction function. / Thesis (Ph.D, Economics) -- Queen's University, 2009-06-15 15:59:13.04

Why do politicians change the legislation governing the central bank to give this institution operational independence in the setting of monetary policy. This thesis examines the political debates over central bank independence in New Zealand, Canada, Australia and New Zealand during the 1980s and 1990s. These cases were selected due to the variation in their levels of central bank independence, while holding key institutional variables constant. Four hypotheses are suggested by the political economy literature to explain the timing of this legislative change: the need to signal creditworthiness to international financial markets, in response to lobbying by domestic interest groups opposed to inflation, in response to proposals from an epistemic community of monetary experts or based on the self-interest of politicians concerned with re-election. The case studies find that politicians delegate to the central bank when this reform has the consensus support of an epistemic community of monetary experts, and a key politician is willing to champion the legislation through parliament. This epistemic community has increased influence during periods of economic uncertainty, such as following a financial crisis. A key politician is motivated to support this reform due to ideological or electoral reasons. This reform was facilitated by political institutions characterised by few checks and balances that concentrated power in the hands of the executive and offered few obstacles to changing the central bank's statute. Central bank independence was rejected in the cases where the epistemic community did not hold a consensus on the need for reform, and politicians saw only electoral risks from changing the central bank's statute. This study finds that politicians retain room to manoeuvre despite the rise of financial globalisation.

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The essay investigates if one monetary policy goal could be sufficient to stabilize both inflation and real economic fluctuations. The results indicate that one policy goal could be sufficient, nonetheless when empirically comparing Sweden and Canada’s monetary policy and the market outcome in these markets.

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This thesis is an empirical comparison of the relationship between money and other key economic variables and investigates an alternative method of defining money in Canada. Severe theoretical problems with traditional monetary aggregation methods are identified and Divisia aggregates are examined through the use of index number and aggregation theory. Summation and Divisia aggregates are constructed, tested and compared in three critical areas: information content, causality and stability. In particular this thesis investigates whether Divisia money is a potentially useful indicator of economic conditions. The data consists of Canadian quarterly observations for the period 1968.1 to 1989.4 for 26 different monetary assets and their own rates of return. The Divisia indices do not clearly outperform their summation counterparts but do show consistent and stable growth trends during the period in question. The results show that Divisia monetary aggregation is theoretically more appealing than the simple sum approach and that Divisia money provides meaningful information for Canadian monetary policy.

This thesis examines the problems posed by Japan???s recent macroeconomic experience for conventional monetary policy theory and practice. Japan???s experience with deflation and the zero lower bound for nominal official interest rates is placed in the context of neo-Wicksellian and monetarist interpretations of the monetary policy transmission mechanism. The neo-Wicksellian approach to the zero bound problem is shown to suffer significant limitations in view of Japan???s experience, while a monetarist interpretation of the transmission mechanism is shown to be more robust. The thesis considers the role of the official interest rate and the money base in vector autoregression models of the Japanese economy, finding that the economy became less amenable to effective stabilisation by monetary policy from the early 1990s onwards. A new approach to estimating a neo-Wicksellian monetary policy rule for the Bank of Japan is proposed and the robustness of the parameters of this rule determined. The thesis motivates a role for the money base in the determination of real output and inflation. A policy rule in the growth rate of the nominal money base is estimated and the stability of its parameters with respect to a hypothesised structural break and changes in the governorship of the Bank of Japan is considered. Aggregate demand and supply specifications for the Japanese economy are estimated that show a distinct role for the money base that is independent of the official interest rate. These specifications are extended to develop a model of the Japanese economy. The model is distinctive in incorporating both neo-Wicksellian and monetarist views of the monetary policy transmission mechanism. The macroeconomic stabilisation properties of various interest rate and money base growth rules are compared in the context of the model, using stochastic simulation methods. In particular, a policy rule in the growth rate of the nominal money base with the nominal official interest rate set to zero is simulated and shown to have macroeconomic stabilisation properties that compare favourably to conventional interest rate rules. The thesis concludes that the neglect of money in contemporary monetary policy theory and practice is mistaken in view of Japan???s recent macroeconomic experience.