The existence of downward nominal price and wage rigidity has been used to argue against the adoption of zero inflation targets. A good deal is known about the nature and extent of price flexibility in Australia. However, little is known about nominal wage flexibility since investigations have...

In the past decade, inflation in Australia and most other industrialised countries has been extremely well behaved. An important question is whether this reflects a series of favourable shocks to prices or a more fundamental change in the inflation process. In this paper, we explore developments...

Over the past two decades, there has been a marked divergence in regional labour market outcomes within Australia. In this paper, we examine two aspects of this divergence. First, we analyse the wide variation in employment growth rates, finding that stronger rates of employment growth were...

The trend rise in import penetration in Australia has renewed interest in the determinants of import volumes. In this paper, an attempt is made to explain the growth in Australia’s imports in terms of the increased openness of the economy. Openness is proxied by the effective rate of...

This paper examines exchange rate pass-through for the prices of both imports and manufactured exports. It is found that, in the long run, exchange rate pass-through over the docks is complete for both classes of good. However, in the short run, responses to currency movements differ...

Widespread reference to the real exchange rate stems from the belief that it is a useful summary indicator of key economic information. There exist, however, two forms of the real exchange rate: one form is based on deviations from purchasing power parity, while the other is based on the ratio...

This paper examines the allocation of private investment and employment between the traded and non-traded goods sectors in Australia. Industries are defined as export oriented, import competing or non-traded according to a classification system not used in previous studies of tradeable capacity....

This paper explores the relationship between the terms of trade and inflation. It shows, both analytically and empirically, that the exchange rate response to a change in the terms of trade is crucial to the inflation outcome. It suggests the existence of a ‘threshold’ exchange rate...

This paper examines the pass-through of exchange rate changes to the domestic prices of imported consumer goods. Two distinct stages can be identified in the adjustment process. First, changes in the exchange rate are passed on to changes in the prices of imports over the docks. Second, these...