Using a pure-exchange overlapping generations model in which money is valued because of a legal restriction, we show the following: a) a benevolent government may make some use of the inflation tax in conjunction with a lump-sum tax on the young but not if lump-sum taxes on the old are...

This paper studies an overlapping generations economy with capital where limited communication and stochastic relocation create an endogenous transactions role for fiat money. We assume a production function with a knowledge externality (Romer-style) that nests economies with endogenous growth...

We explore the connection between optimal monetary policy and heterogeneity among agents. We utilize a standard monetary economy with two types of agents that differ in the marginal utility they derive from real money balances - a framework that produces a nondegenerate stationary distribution...

We study several popular monetary models which generate a nondegenerate stationary distribution of money holdings. Across these environments, our principal finding is as follows: a monetary policy that sets long run nominal interest rates to zero (the Friedman rule) does not typically maximize...

Does it matter in a revenue-neutral setting if the government changes the inflation tax base or the inflation tax rate? We answer this question using an overlapping generations model in which bonds, capital, and cash reserves coexist, and the government uses seigniorage to service its debt,...

Does it matter in a revenue-neutral setting if the government changes the inflation tax base or the inflation tax rate? We answer this question using an overlapping generations model in which bonds, capital, and cash reserves coexist, and the government uses seigniorage to service its debt,...

This paper clarifies and extends previous work on the equivalence between monetary regimes and fiscal regimes involving social security systems. We show that monetary regimes involving currency and unbacked bonds, with or without reserve requirements, are equivalent to one or both of two...

We study monetary models with nondegenerate stationary distributions of money holdings. We find that the Friedman rule does not typically maximize ex post social welfare. An increase in the rate of growth of the money supply has two effects: the standard distortionary, or rate-of-return, effect...

We present an analysis of how political factors may come into play in the equilibrium determination of inflation. We employ a standard overlapping generations model with heterogenous young-age endowments, and a government that funds an exogenous spending via a combination of non-distortionary...

In this paper, we consider a government that executes a permanent open market sale. The government is forced to eventually monetize the debt, choosing between changing either the money growth rate (the inflation-tax rate) or the reserve requirement ratio (the inflation-tax base). We first derive...