This paper uses the old-Keynesian representative agent model developed in Farmer (2010b) to answer two questions: 1) do increased government purchases crowd out private consumption? 2) do increased government purchases reduce unemployment? Farmer compared permanent tax financed expenditure paths...

More advanced technologies demand higher degrees of specialization - and longer chains of production connecting raw inputs to final outputs. Longer production chains are subject to a "weakest link" effect: they are more fragile and more prone to failure. Optimal chain length is determined by the...

This paper presents a theory of the monetary transmission mechanism in a monetary version of Farmer's (2009) model in which there are multiple equilibrium unemployment rates. The model has two equations in common with the new-Keynesian model; the optimizing IS curve and the policy rule. It...

This paper analyzes the timing, pace and efficiency of the on- going job reallocation that results from product and process innovation. There are strong reasons why an efficient economy ought to concentrate both job creation and destruction during cyclical downturns, when the opportunity cost of...

This paper explores the interaction between fiscal policy and unemployment. It develops a dynamic economic model in which unemployment can arise but can be mitigated by tax cuts and public spending increases. Such policies are fiscally costly, but can be financed by issuing government debt. In...

This paper examines the optimal labor contract in a small open economy with incomplete markets under international price uncertainty. The effect on employment, wages, and profits of different realizations of the state of nature is studied and agents' preferences concerning the implementation of...

The great contraction of 2008 pushed the U.S. economy into a protracted liquidity trap (i.e., a long period with zero nominal interest rates and inflationary expectations below target). In addition, the recovery was jobless (i.e., output growth recovered but unemployment lingered). This paper...

This paper studies the role of employer behavior in generating "negative duration dependence" -- the adverse effect of a longer unemployment spell -- by sending fictitious resumes to real job postings in 100 U.S. cities. Our results indicate that the likelihood of receiving a callback for an...

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...

This paper considers a dynamic, non-steady state environment in which wage dispersion exists and evolves in response to shocks. Workers do not observe firm productivity and firms do not commit to future wages, but there is on-the-job search for higher paying jobs. The model allows for firm...