Two major events have affected the monetary regime in the United Kingdom in recent years, namely the introduction of inflation targeting, and the granting of operational independence to the Bank of England. In this paper we examine what impact, if any, these events have had on inflation...

This paper uses mortgage data to construct a measure of terms on which households access to external finance, and relates it to consumption at both the aggregate and cohort levels. The Household External Finance (HEF) index is based on the spread paid by risky borrowers in the mortgage market....