Selgin's Theorem -- that a free banking system operating on a fixed supply of commodity reserves acts to stabilize total nominal spending per year -- provides an analytical bridge between this alternative regime and conventional monetary theory. For a system of competing banks subject to...

This paper investigates how the identification assumptions of monetary policy shocks modify the inference in a standard DSGE model. Considering SVAR models in which either the interest rate is predetermined for money or these two monetary variables are simultaneously determined, two DSGE models...

Keynes implicitly used the concept of duration to analyze the impacts of expected changes in the price of a perpetual bond and coupon payments that led to his “square rule.” Keynes's result (“square rule”), derived from the breakeven condition, was just a simplification to illustrate the...

Since the late 1980s the Fed has implemented monetary policy by adjusting its target for the overnight federal funds rate. Money's role in monetary policy has been tertiary, at best. Indeed, several influential economists have suggested that money is irrelevant for monetary policy. They suggest...

Monetary policy is now conducted by targeting a very short-term interest rate. The Fed and other central banks attempt to control the price level by manipulating aggregate demand by adjusting their interest rate target. At best, money's role is tertiary. Indeed, a few prominent and influential...

Some have argued that a significant decrease in the demand for money, due to financial innovations, could imply that central banks are unable to implement effective monetary policies. This paper argues that central banks are always able to influence the economy's interest rates, because their...

This paper presents a systematic empirical relationship between money and subsequent prices and output, using US, euro area and Swiss data since the 1960-70s. Monetary developments, unlike interest rate stance measures, are shown to provide qualitative and quantitative information on subsequent...

In the last decade, advanced economies, including the euro area, experienced deflationary pressures caused by the global financial crisis of 2007-2009 and the anti-crisis policies that followed - in particular, the new financial regulations (which led to a deep decline in the money multiplier)....

The excess liquidity in the euro area is a product of a long period of quantitative easing. It changed the operational framework of the European Central Bank (ECB)’s monetary policy from the scarce reserves system (SRS) to the abundant reserves system (ARS). To eliminate excess liquidity and...

Assets have "indirect liquidity" if they cannot be used as media of exchange, but can be traded to obtain a medium of exchange (money) and thereby inherit monetary properties. This essay describes a simple dynamic model of indirect asset liquidity, provides closed form solutions for real and...