This paper creates a new series of the FOMC*s Target for the federal funds rate for the period September 27, 1982 through December 31, 1993. The creation of this series was motivated by Thornton (2005). Analyzing the verbatim transcripts of the FOMC, Thornton finds that most of the FOMC believed...

Despite its important role in macroeconomics and finance, the expectations hypothesis (EH) of the term structure of interest rates has received little empirical support. While the EH*s poor performance has been attributed to a variety of sources, none appear to account for the EH*s poor...

Motivated, on the one hand, by the belief that the Fed controls the short-term rate through open market operations, and on the other, by "the lack of convincing proof that this is what happens," Hamilton (1997) suggested that more convincing evidence of the liquidity effect could be obtained...