The author explicitly specifies a New Keynesian style model embodying a financial constraint on the availability of equity and a financial market imperfection with regard to the existence of state-contingent assets based upon the published papers of Greenwald and Stiglitz (1988, 1990, and 1993). Using computer based numerical simulation, the author validates the three unproven Propositions found in the Greenwald and Stiglitz 1993 article with regard to the model's comparative static behaviour. Through the inclusion of a parameter for technology into the production function, the author shows that observations made by Greenwald and Stiglitz with regard to the effect of equity infusions is subject to qualification. Investigation of the model's inter-temporal behaviour reveals that the claims made by Greenwald and Stiglitz with regard to multiple periodicity are again subject to many qualifications. Linearization around the steady-state equilibrium as suggested by Greenwald and Stiglitz is shown to offer limited insight because of the implied non-linearity of the model's first order difference equation. Calibrated numerical simulation of the nonlinear difference equation reveals the potential for both single and multiple periodicity, period doubling bifurcations, and chaotic trajectories displaying sensitivity to initial conditions. In addition it was shown that the model's implied random attractor was key to understanding its inter-temporal behavior. In the Greenwald and Stiglitz articles the existence of derivative markets such as futures or options to manage risk are assumed away. The author, in order to investigate the effects of futures or options markets upon business cycles, modifies the explicitly specified model to include the use of state-contingent assets. Introducing the use of derivative financial products to manage risk, using numerical simulation, produces the surprising result that in the aggregate they may lead to slightly greater output instability. In addition to the model's structure, several intuitive reasons for these results are discussed in depth. The Greenwald and Stiglitz model also assumed that the cost of capital was not risk adjusted. The author modifies the explicitly specified model and using numerical simulation shows that like other unrealistic assumptions concerning dividend distribution, leads to alternative laws of motion. The research is concluded with discussion of possible policy and regulatory implications.

This thesis examines the extent to which institutional transparency is counterproductive and potentially politicizing within the U.S. Federal Reserve system. It exemplifies a Venn diagram intersection of political and economic theory – and given the meaningful change in behavior at the Fed – to some extent organizational theory as well. This political economy orientation may be illustrated by providing a historical context – and then addressing the relevant catalysts for change: legislative action, financial crises, and the increase in social media technology. In terms of a “broader view,” these changes have occurred against a backdrop of significant changes in the application of Keynesian theories. As a result, this thesis defines modern transparency at the Federal Reserve, including its benefits and potential drawbacks, by connecting the changes in policies and procedures over the last quarter century - and by showing the impact of the evolution of modern New Keynesian interventionist programs within this new environment. The conclusions shown the New Keynesian coincidental contributions to modern interventionalist policies. But the benefits that come from improved transparency have opened the door to unintended consequences – and the main takeaway is the potential for political bias among bankers and the time inconsistencies that come from short-term modifications to otherwise long-term problems. The “secrets of the temple” are no longer secrets…but Greider would agree that the concentration of power and political influence remains the same. / M.A. / This thesis explores to what extent is increased transparency counterproductive and potentially politicizing within the U.S. Federal Reserve system. The Fed is primarily responsible for maintaining price stability, facilitating full employment, and maintaining the health of the banking system, placing it both directly and indirectly at the center of power and influence within American politics. FOMC decisions directly affect American citizens. For instance, their interest rate policies influence the cost of a mortgage, a car loan, a student loan, or possibly the value of 401k accounts – and in the 21st century, the average American is more tied to “credit” than ever before. This analysis will consider how this initiative developed, its original intent, its evolution, and why it may result in significant unintended political consequences. The conclusions illustrated that there are benefits that come from improved transparency. However, improved transparency may have opened the door to unintended consequences.

The topic of fiscal policy has been long neglected in terms of fiscal policy's interdependence with other main macroeconomic variables. Presented thesis therefore analyses the validity of different fiscal policy models for the case of Czech Republic. Dynamic stochastic general equilibrium (DSGE) framework is used throughout the thesis. Different fiscal policy rules are put into otherwise identical - benchmark - model and the models are compared to each other and to the benchmark model. The analysed fiscal policy models are an acyclical, counter- cyclical, two pro-cyclical and dichotomous spending models. We find that the most plausible fiscal policy rule is of pro-cyclical type and closely follows the model of Alesina et al. (2008). The model assumes that interest groups can steal part of government income through corruption and voters cannot observe it, so they demand maximum fiscal spending in the good times. The logic of this model is in accordance with the current state of fiscal and economic behaviour in Czech Republic.

In recent years the New Keynesian framework has become widely used to identify the relationship between monetary policy, inflation, the business cycle and welfare. Most commonly in these models inertia in prices are introduced only through the aggregate supply side which generates a short run non-neutrality of money. This thesis begins with an investigation into the impact of sticky prices on the macroeconomic equilibrium through aggregate demand. We show that in models of price stickiness among differentiated goods aggregate consumption deviates from the conventional Euler equation due to relative price distortions. This has some non-negligible implications: there are additional inflation effects, which enter through aggregate demand, that lower the response of the marginal cost and dampen responses of inflation and output; products' price elasticity of demand affects equilibrium output and inflation dynamics independently of supply factors; monetary policy responses are smoother than in the conventional new Keynesian models, particularly the more competitive are the products markets. In chapter 2 we continue with an investigation into the impact that the aforementioned channel has on welfare and monetary policy under various regimes. Specifically, we compare our results with the benchmark New Keynesian model with a cost channel for alternative levels of competition in the goods market. When the central bank is assumed to follow a Taylor rule we find, contrary to the standard New Keynesian literature, that welfare losses ultimately fall as the goods market becomes more competitive. Furthermore, there are additional adverse implications for welfare coming through an exaggerated stabilisation bias associated with discretionary policy in our model version. A move to optimal commitment implies significant additional gains compared to the standard literature by; eliminating this amplified stabilisation bias and; reducing further the fall in output gap and inflation fluctuations at the time of shock. The final part of this thesis develops a Generalised Taylor economy to include a financial market. This finance sector is characterised by savings contracts to households and loan contracts to firms, both of which are differentiated by the duration for which their interest rate remains fixed. Additionally, a time varying external finance premium on loan rates is introduced through an endogenous probability of firm default. Using break-even conditions we show that the fixed markup on loan rates is dependent on, the expected default risk over the lifetime of the contract, and, spillovers from the unexpected losses of current "locked in" financial contracts that must be accounted for in the zero profit condition of the commercial bank. Our results indicate that inertia in loan and savings rates dampens the responses of monetary policy and the business cycle whilst generating a procylical loan rate spread. In contrast, risk of default amplifies the business cycle and delivers a countercyclical loan rate spread. The overall impact of these two channels on the direction and magnitude of loan rate spreads, spillovers to new contracts and the dynamics of the business cycle, are shown depend on the type of shock hitting the economy.

No description available.

We generalize a simple New Keynesian model and show that a flattening of the Phillips curve reduces the size of fiscal multipliers at the zero lower bound (ZLB) on the nominal interest rate. The factors behind the flatting are consistent with micro- and macroeconomic empirical evidence: it is a result of, not a higher level of price rigidity, but an increase in the degree of strategic complementarity in price-setting -- invoked by the assumption of a specific instead of an economy-wide labour market, and decreasing instead of constant-returns-to-scale. In normal times, the efficacy of fiscal policy and resulting multipliers tends to be small because negative wealth effects crowd out consumption, and because monetary policy endogenously reacts to fiscally-driven increases in inflation and output by raising rates, offsetting part of the stimulus. In times of a binding ZLB and a fixed nominal rate, an increase in (expected) inflation instead lowers the real rate, leading to larger fiscal multipliers. Conditional on being in a ZLB-environment, under a flatter Phillips curve, increases in expected inflation are lower, so that fiscal multipliers at the ZLB tend to be lower. Finally, we also discuss the role of solution methods in determining the size of fiscal multipliers. / Series: Department of Economics Working Paper Series

<p>Two DSGE models are calibrated and simulated to investigate how the role of monetarypolicy differs between a closed and an open economy. The central bank conducts monetary policy according to a Taylor (1993) rule, reacting to inflation- and output deviations. Prices are sticky and there are habit components which slow down adjustment of consumption and exports. The models are subjected to shocks in the interest rate, inflation, technology and consumption. In most of the cases the shocks have a bigger and quicker affect on output and employment in the open economy. In connection with positive consumption- and interest rate shocks inflation is big and negative at first but gets positive already two quarters after the shock, due to effects in the exchange rate channel. In closed and open economies, a stronger reaction to output, than in the standard Taylor (1993) rule, decreases welfare losses dramatically.</p>

<p>This thesis consists of four self-contained essays.</p><p><b>Essay 1</b> compares the dynamic behaviour of an estimated New Keynesian sticky-price model with one-period delayed effects of monetary policy shocks to the dynamics of a structural vector autoregression model. The model is estimated with Bayesian techniques on German pre-EMU data. The dynamics of the sticky-price model following either a demand shock or monetary policy shock are qualitatively and quantitatively comparable to those of the estimated structural VAR. When compared to the delayed-effects model, an alternative model with contemporaneous effects of monetary policy is rejected according to the posterior-odds ratio criterion.</p><p><b>Essay 2</b> addresses the transmission of exchange-rate variations in an estimated, small open-economy model. In contrast to the standard New Open Economy Macroeconomics framework, imported goods are treated here as material inputs to production. The resulting model structure is transparent and tractable while also able to account for imperfect pass through of exchange-rate shocks. The model is estimated with Bayesian methods on German data and the key finding is that a substantial depreciation of the nominal exchange rate leads to only modest effects on CPI inflation. An extended version of the model reveals that relatively small weight is placed on foreign consumption.</p><p><b>Essay 3</b> (with Annika Alexius) analyses the strong responses of long-term interest rates to shocks that are difficult to explain with standard macroeconomic models. Augmenting the standard model to include a time-varying equilibrium real interest rate generates forward rates that exhibit considerable movement at long horizons in response to movements of the policy-controlled short rate. In terms of coefficients from regressions of long-rate changes on short-rate movements, incorporating a time-varying natural rate explains a significant fraction of the excess sensitivity puzzle.</p><p><b>Essay 4</b> (with Pär Österholm) argues that the common finding of a large and significant coefficient on the lagged interest rate in Taylor rules may be the consequence of misspecification, specifically an omitted variables problem. Our Monte Carlo study shows that omitting relevant variables from the estimated Taylor rule can generate significant partial-adjustment coefficients, despite the data generating process containing no interest-rate smoothing. We further show that misspecification leads to considerable size distortions in two recently proposed tests to distinguish between interest-rate.</p>

Derivation and Estimation of a New Keynesian Phillips Curve in a Small Open Economy This paper explores how well Swedish inflation is explained by a New Keynesian Phillips Curve. As the real driving variable in the Phillips Curve, a measure of firms' real marginal cost is compared to the traditional output gap. The results show that, with real marginal cost in the Phillips Curve equation, the point estimates generally have the expected positive sign, which is less frequently the case with the output gap. However, with both real marginal cost and the output gap, it is difficult to pin down a statistically significant relationship with inflation. Firm-Level Evidence of Shifts in the Supply of Credit This paper examines empirically whether firms are subject to shifts in credit supply over the business cycle. Shifts in the supply of credit are identified by exploring how firms substitute between commitment credit -- lines of credit -- and non-commitment credit. The results show that firms on average rely more on commitment credits when monetary policy is tight and when the financial health of banks is weaker. The results are consistent with a bank lending channel of monetary policy and with shifts in the supply of credit following deteriorations in banks' balance sheets. Lines of Credit and Investment: Firm-Level Evidence of Real Effects of the Financial Crisis This paper studies how the 2008 financial crisis affected corporate investment in Sweden through its effect on credit availability. The approach is to compare investments of firms before and after the onset of the crisis as a function of their ex ante sensitivity to a credit supply shock, controlling for fundamental determinants of investments. Sensitivity to a credit supply shock is measured as credit reserves, defined as unused credit on lines of credit. The results indicate that the decline in investment following the crisis was not exacerbated by a contraction in the supply of credit.

This thesis consists of four self-contained essays. <b>Essay 1</b> compares the dynamic behaviour of an estimated New Keynesian sticky-price model with one-period delayed effects of monetary policy shocks to the dynamics of a structural vector autoregression model. The model is estimated with Bayesian techniques on German pre-EMU data. The dynamics of the sticky-price model following either a demand shock or monetary policy shock are qualitatively and quantitatively comparable to those of the estimated structural VAR. When compared to the delayed-effects model, an alternative model with contemporaneous effects of monetary policy is rejected according to the posterior-odds ratio criterion. <b>Essay 2</b> addresses the transmission of exchange-rate variations in an estimated, small open-economy model. In contrast to the standard New Open Economy Macroeconomics framework, imported goods are treated here as material inputs to production. The resulting model structure is transparent and tractable while also able to account for imperfect pass through of exchange-rate shocks. The model is estimated with Bayesian methods on German data and the key finding is that a substantial depreciation of the nominal exchange rate leads to only modest effects on CPI inflation. An extended version of the model reveals that relatively small weight is placed on foreign consumption. <b>Essay 3</b> (with Annika Alexius) analyses the strong responses of long-term interest rates to shocks that are difficult to explain with standard macroeconomic models. Augmenting the standard model to include a time-varying equilibrium real interest rate generates forward rates that exhibit considerable movement at long horizons in response to movements of the policy-controlled short rate. In terms of coefficients from regressions of long-rate changes on short-rate movements, incorporating a time-varying natural rate explains a significant fraction of the excess sensitivity puzzle. <b>Essay 4</b> (with Pär Österholm) argues that the common finding of a large and significant coefficient on the lagged interest rate in Taylor rules may be the consequence of misspecification, specifically an omitted variables problem. Our Monte Carlo study shows that omitting relevant variables from the estimated Taylor rule can generate significant partial-adjustment coefficients, despite the data generating process containing no interest-rate smoothing. We further show that misspecification leads to considerable size distortions in two recently proposed tests to distinguish between interest-rate.