The paper examines the timing of exit from the interwar gold-exchange standard for a panel of European countries, based on monthly data over the period January 1928 - December 1936. I show that exit from gold can be understood in terms of a trade-off between a limited set of factors commonly...

Did adoption of the gold standard exacerbate or diminish macroeconomic volatility? Supporters thought so, critics thought not, and theory offers ambiguous messages. A hard exchange-rate regime such as the gold standard might limit monetary shocks if it ties the hands of policy makers. But any...

This paper examines the role of currency and banking in the German financial crisis of 1931 for both Germany and the U.S. We specify a structural dynamic factor model to identify financial and monetary factors separately for each of the two economies. We find that monetary transmission through...

This paper traces the evolution of debate about the question of Rules versus Discretion in monetary policy from about 1800 until the mid 1930s. Particular attention is paid to long-versus-short-run issues, notably with respect to the 1844 Bank Charter Act, and the Bagehot Principle, as well as...

This paper describes the monetary policy response of countries during the inter-war period. How did central banks react to the Great Depression? How did countries balance the externals demands of the gold standard with domestic policy pressures? What was the optimal level of international policy...

Like the gold standard, price level targeting (PT) involves not letting past deviations of inflation be bygones; both regimes return the price level (or price of gold) to its target. The experience of suspension of the gold standard in World War I, resumption in the 1920s (for some countries at...

First established during the 1830's, the Enskilda banks were characterized by unlimited owner liability and the right to issue bank notes. Consequently, in Swedish banking history, these banks have been considered to be primitive relics. This paper utilizes new data to revise this picture of the...

This paper studies the role of bank notes issued by the private Enskilda banks in the expansion of the Swedish monetary stock under the classic specie standard maintained during the period 1834-1913. The use of balance sheets has made possible the estimation of more accurate and continuous...

According to the classical view, an economy's lender of last resort should be its central bank. For brief periods of time, the bank might suspend convertibility in order to provide the liquidity needed to support the domestic credit market. Recent experience of financial crises demonstrates the...