This paper argues that limited asset market participation is crucial in explaining U.S. macroeconomic performance and monetary policy before the 1980s, and their changes thereafter. We develop an otherwise standard sticky-price dynamic stochastic general equilibrium model, which implies that at...

Intro -- Contents -- I. Introduction -- II. Limited Asset Market Participation and Monetary Policy: Some Theory -- III. Empirical Evidence -- IV. Change in Structure of Economy or in Distribution of Shocks? -- V. Conclusions -- General Model.