We construct a dynamic general equilibrium model in which the typical industry colludes by threatening to punish deviations from an implicitly agreed upon pricing path. We argue that models of this type explain better than do competitive models the way in which the economy responds to aggregate...

We show that modifying the standard neoclassical growth model by assuming that competition is imperfect makes it easier to explain the size of the declines in output and real wages that follow increases in the price of oil. Plausibly parameterized models of this type are able to mimic the...

This paper shows that the output losses from energy taxes are significantly larger than usually computed when due account is taken of imperfect competition among energy using firms. Even with perfect competition among these firms, the loss in GNP is of the same order of magnitude as the revenue...

If changes in aggregate demand were an important source of macroeconomic fluctuations, real wages would be countercyclical unless markups of price over marginal cost were themselves countercyclical. We thus examine three theories of markup variation at cyclical frequencies. The first assumes...

Because inputs are scarce, marginal cost should be an increasing function of output. Without changes in this real marginal cost schedule, aggregate output can vary if and only if the markup of price over marginal cost varies. In this review, we discuss the extent to which observed fluctuations...

This paper discusses the consequences of introducing imperfectly competitive product markets into an otherwise standard neoclassical growth model. We pay particular attention to the consequences of imperfect competition for the explanation of fluctuations in aggregate economic activity. Market...

This paper evaluates alternative rules by which the Fed may set interest rates using the small model of the U.S. economy estimated in Rotemberg and Woodford (1997). Our main substantive finding is that low and stable inflation together with stable interest rates can be achieved by letting the...

This paper studies the persistence and some of the consequences of the eventual abandonment by the FOMC of the principles embedded in the Federal Reserve's Tenth Annual Report of 1923. The three principles I focus on are 1) the discouraging of speculative lending by commercial banks, 2) the...

A model is considered where firms internalize the regret costs that consumers experience when they see an unexpected price change. Regret costs are assumed to be increasing in the size of price changes and this can explain why the size of price increases is less sensitive to inflation than in...

We show that comovements of individual stock prices cannot be justified by economic fundamentals. This finding is a rejection of the present value model of security valuation. Unlike other tests of this model, ours is robust in that it allows for volatility in ex ante rates of return. The only...