This paper analyzes the sustainability of fixed exchange rates by extending the Barro-Gordon framework to a fully dynamic context in which the level of a state variable (in this case debt) determines the payoffs available to the government at each point in time. The model yields the following...

This paper studies the fluctuations of foreign exchange reserves under a regime of credibly fixed exchange rates. The paper considers a variety of assumptions on the determinants of money demand and currency substitution

This paper finds that limited exchange rate flexibility in the form of "fear of appreciation" significantly slows adjustment of current account imbalances, providing novel support for Friedman's conjecture regarding exchange-rate flexibility. We present a new stylized fact: floaters have faster...

This paper studies the relationship between financial structure and the welfare consequences of fixed exchange rate regimes in small open emerging economies with downward nominal wage rigidity. The paper presents two surprising results. First, a pegging economy might be better off with a closed...

We lay down a standard macroeconomic model of a small open economy with a fixed exchange rate and study optimal capital controls (defined as maximizing the utility of a representative household). We provide sharp analytical and numerical characterizations for a variety of shocks. We find that...

The combination of a fixed exchange rate and downward nominal wage rigidity creates a real rigidity. In turn, this real rigidity makes the economy prone to involuntary unemployment during external crises. This paper presents a graphical analysis of alternative policy strategies aimed at...

The influential Krugman-Flood-Garber (KFG) model of balance of payment crises assumes that a fixed exchange rate is abandoned if and only if international reserves reach a critical threshold value. From a positive standpoint, the KFG rule is at odds with many episodes in which the central bank...

Fixed exchange rates are less volatile than floating rates. But the volatility of macroeconomic variables such as money and output does not change very much across exchange rate regimes. This suggests that exchange rate models based only on macroeconomic fundamentals are unlikely to be very...

The paper argues that the reason real world fixed exchange rate regimes usually have finite bands instead of completely fixed exchange rates between realignments is that exchange rate bands, counter to the textbook result, give central banks some monetary independence, even with free...