In this paper, we study the effectiveness of monetary policy in a severe recession and deflation when nominal interest rates are bounded at zero. We compare two alternative proposals for ameliorating the effect of the zero bound: an exchange-rate peg and price-level targeting. We conduct this...

This paper uses a small, calibrated forward-looking model of the euro-area economy to investigate the implications of incomplete information about potential output for the conduct and the design of monetary policy. Three sets of issues are examined. First, the certainty-equivalent optimal policy...

This paper characterizes the optimal inflation buffer consistent with a zero lower bound on nominal interest rates in a New Keynesian sticky-price model. It is shown that a purely forward-looking version of the model that abstracts from inflation inertia would significantly underestimate the...

This paper considers the evidence of “near-rationality†in household inflation expectations, as described by Akerlof, Dickens, and Perry (2000), hereafter ADP. According to ADP, the economic incentive to anticipate inflation varies from agent to agent, and as inflation falls, some...

We address robustness of inflation targeting rules in a New Keynesian model using two approaches. Firstly we use the Hansen-Sargent method, borrowed from the control theory literature, to design robust rules on the basis of the policymaker playing a game against malign nature. This welfare-based...