The introduction of inflation targets in Canada in 1991 clarified the objectives of monetary policy. One of the objectives of the new policy was to ensure that the public would henceforth be able to more easily assess monetary policy performance based on the Bank of Canada's record at achieving...

Post-1990 Chinese monetary policy is modeled with an augmented McCallum-type rule that takes into account the People's Bank of China's emphasis on targeting the rate of money supply growth. People's Bank policy appears responsive to the gap between target and actual nominal GDP as well as to...

A notable feature of the 1920s and 1930s is the volatility in several key macroeconomic aggregates, and this feature used to econometrically identify the reaction of the Fed to stock market developments. The volatility of economic activity may have contributed to deepening the divisions among...

This paper proposes that an important instrument of monetary policy of the Bundesbank, is how it communicates with the public. We argue that communication by senior central bank officials represents an instrument of monetary policy that complements changes in interest rates. Moreover, the...

In this paper we provide an estimate of the likelihood of conflict between the federal government and the Bundesbank for the 1989 - 1998 period. We rely on a novel proxy for the impact of public communication by Bundesbank officials on the probability of conflict, in addition to interest rate,...

Relying on Clive Granger's many and varied contributions to econometric analysis, this paper considers some of the key econometric considerations involved in estimating Taylor type rules for US data. We focus on the roles of unit roots, cointegration, structural breaks, and non-linearities to...

Stylized facts suggest that the monetary policies in the US versus dollar bloc countries that formally target inflation (Australia, Canada, and New Zealand) place somewhat different emphasis on inflation than on other factors (e.g., output gap). We use parameter estimated from versions of models...

This study considers the role of the yield curve as a predictor of future interest rates, inflation rates and economic activity for New Zealand. To provide a basis for comparison, data from Australia and the US are also considered. Many studies have shown a strong empirical link between the...

One way of evaluating how well monetary authorities perform is to provide the public with a regular and independent second opinion. The European Central Bank (ECB) and the Bank of England (BoE) are shadowed by professional and academic economists who provide a separate policy rate recommendation...

This paper considers the role of the monetary conditions index as a tool to coomunicate the stance of monetary policy. The MCI is a linear combination of interest rate and exchange rate changes. Canada and New Zeland are pioneers in its usage. While the MCI was intended to increase monetary...