We determine the optimal degree of price inflation volatility when nominal wages are sticky and the government uses state-contingent inflation to finance government spending. We address this question in a well-understood Ramsey model of fiscal and monetary policy, in which the benevolent planner...

Ramsey models of fiscal and monetary policy with perfectly-competitive product markets and a fixed supply of capital predict highly volatile inflation with no serial correlation. In this paper, we show that an otherwise-standard Ramsey model that incorporates capital accumulation and habit...

Changes in monetary policy are typically implemented gradually, an empirical observation known as interest-rate smoothing. We propose the explanation that time-non-separable preferences may render interest-rate smoothing optimal. We find that when consumers have "catching-up-with-the-Joneses"...

We study Ramsey-optimal fiscal policy in an economy in which product varieties are the result of forward-looking investment decisions by firms. There are two main results. First, depending on the particular form of variety aggregation in preferences, firms' dividend payments may be either...

This paper characterizes efficient labor-market allocations in a labor selection model. The model's crucial aspect is cross-sectional heterogeneity for new job contacts, which leads to an endogenous selection threshold for new hires. With cross-sectional dispersion calibrated to microeconomic...

This paper characterizes efficient labor-market allocations in a labor selection model. The model's crucial aspect is cross-sectional heterogeneity for new job contacts, which leads to an endogenous selection threshold for new hires. With cross-sectional dispersion calibrated to microeconomic...

We identify the main shock driving fluctuations in long‐horizon productivity expectations, consistent with theories of TFP news. The identified shock induces strong comovement patterns in output, consumption, investment, employment, and stock prices even though TFP does not change...

We identify the main shock driving fluctuations in long-horizon productivity expectations, consistent with theories of TFP news. The identified shock induces strong comovement patterns in output, consumption, investment, employment, and stock prices even though TFP does not change significantly...