This paper studies the determinants of business cycles in small open economies and adds to the discussion about the changing nature of inflation dynamics. We estimate a series of VAR models for a set of six Asian emerging market economies, in which we identify a battery of domestic and global...

Bank of Canada research done prior to the most recent renewal of the inflation-control agreement in 2011 concluded that the benefits associated with a target below 2 per cent were insufficient to justify the increased risk of being constrained by the zero lower bound (ZLB) on nominal interest...

In Canada, targeting the inflation rate was intended as a temporary measure on a journey to price-level stability, but became a well-established monetary policy regime in its own right. This paper analyses the role of the interaction of economic ideas with the experience generated by their...

We study the design of optimal monetary policy (Ramsey policies) in a model with sticky prices and unionized labour markets. Collective wage bargaining and unions monopoly power tend to dampen wage fluctuations and to amplify employment fluctuations relatively to a DNK model with walrasian...

We compare two widely used pricing assumptions in the New-Keynesian literature: the Calvo and Rotemberg price-setting mechanisms. We show that, once trend in?ation is taken into account, the two models are very different. i) The long-run relationship between inflation and output is positive in...

The purpose of this paper is to make a quantitative contribution to the inflation versus price level targeting debate. It considers a policy-maker that can set policy either through an inflation targeting rule or a price level targeting rule to minimize a quadratic loss function using the actual...

Monetary policy is modeled as being governed by a known rule, except for a time-varying target rate of inflation. The variable target can be thought of as standing in for either discretionary deviations from the rule, or as the outcome of a policymaking committee that is unable to arrive at a...

Monetary policy instruments differ in tightness-how closely they are linked to inflation-and transparency-how easily they can be monitored. Tightness is always desirable in a monetary policy instrument; when is transparency? When a government cannot commit to follow a given policy. We apply this...

Standard New Keynesian (NK) models feature an optimal inflation target well below two percent, limited welfare losses from business cycle fluctuations and long-term monetary neutrality. We develop a NK framework with labour market frictions, endogenous productivity and downward wage rigidity...

We use a standard new Keynesian model to evaluate the cost of disinflation - measured by the sacrifice ratio, the central bank's loss function, and the welfare cost - in a small open economy vis-à-vis a closed economy. Disinflation is either more costly or less beneficial in the small open...