"Forecast targeting," forward-looking monetary policy that uses central-bank judgment to construct optimal policy projections of the target variables and the instrument rate, may perform substantially better than monetary policy that disregards judgment and follows a given instrument rule. This...

We study empirically the macroeconomic effects of an explicit de jure quantitative goal for monetary policy. Quantitative goals take three forms: exchange rates, money growth rates, and inflation targets. We analyze the effects on inflation of both having a quantitative target, and of hitting a...

We examine to what extent variants of inflation-forecast targeting can avoid stabilization bias, incorporate history-dependence, and achieve determinancy of equilibrium, so as to reproduce a socially optimal equilibrium. We also evaluate these variants in terms of the transparency of the...

In this paper we calculate robustly optimal monetary policy rules for several variants of a simple optimizing model of the monetary transmission mechanism with sticky prices and/or wages. We discuss representations of optimal policy both in terms of interest-rate feedback rules that generalize...

This paper proposes a general method for deriving an optimal monetary policy rule in the case of a dynamic linear rational-expectations model and a quadratic objective function for policy. A commitment to a rule of the type proposed results in a determinate equilibrium in which the responses to...

This paper characterizes the properties of various interest-rate rules in a basic forward-looking model. We compare simple Taylor rules and rules that respond to price-level fluctuations (called Wicksellian rules). We argue that by introducing an appropriate amount of history dependence in...

This paper makes changes in monetary policy rules (or regimes) endogenous. Changes are triggered when certain endogenous variables cross specified thresholds. Rational expectations equilibria are examined in three models of threshold switching to illustrate that (i) expectations formation...

Policymakers increasingly view short-term nominal interest rates as the main instrument of monetary policy, often in conjunction with some inflation target. Interest rates on short-term indexed government debt (i.e., a real interest rate) have also been used as policy instruments. To understand...