Using monthly post-1995 Japanese data we propose a new sign-restriction based approach to identify monetary policy shocks when the economy is at the zero-lower bound (ZLB). The identifying restrictions are thoroughly grounded in liquidity trap theory. Our results show that a quantitative easing...

Using post-1995 Japanese data we propose a new sign restriction SVAR approach to identify monetary policy shocks when the economy is at the Zero Lower Bound (ZLB). The identifying restrictions are based on predictions of Eggertsson’s (2010) New Keynesian DSGE models when the economy is stuck...

The Spanish economy is currently plagued by a deep recession with very high unemployment. We ask how much of the unemployment increase in Spain can be traced back to the debt deleveraging needs of Spanish households. We use provincial household debt and sectoral unemployment data and follow Mian...

We propose a novel method to correct break-even inflation rates derived from index-linked bonds for liquidity and inflation risk premia without resorting to survey based measures. In a state-space framework the difference between break-even inflation rates and unobserved true inflation...

The article reviews the debate on government spending multiplier and provides a detailed discussion of the underlying economic mechanisms, focusing on the role of the state of the business cycle and the monetary policy reaction. Special emphasis is on the effects of fiscal policy within a...