We look at the implications of uncertain monetary policy preferences for the targeting and contracting approach to monetary stability. It turns out that in presence of uncertain preferences a linear incentive contract in the sense of Walsh (1995) performs better in terms of social welfare than...

This paper introduces a parameter for central bank independence in a monetary policy game with a conservative central banker. It tries to explain the optimal degree of central bank independence and conservativeness by four economic and political determinants, both theoretically and empirically....