This paper describes one of the first attempts to gauge the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on the global trajectory of real GDP over the course of 2020 and 2021. It is also among the first efforts to distinguish between the role of domestic variables and global trade in transmitting the...

This paper assesses Latin American monetary policy during the pandemic era against the benchmark of a "balanced" monetary policy strategy, that is, a strategy in which policies respond both to deviations of economic activity from equilibrium as well as deviations of inflation from target. We...

In recent months, as inflation has stubbornly refused to back down and the Federal Reserve threatens ever more monetary tightening, a fearful narrative has taken hold: Rising U.S. interest rates are boosting the dollar to record levels, forcing cheaper currencies and higher import costs onto...

Many observers, including officials at the Federal Reserve, have focused on the need for wages to decelerate if progress toward reducing inflation is to be sustained. We agree that current elevated rates of wage growth would not be consistent with the Fed's 2 percent inflation target in the...

A persistent issue for central banks in emerging market economies (EMEs) has been their difficulties in pursuing counter-cyclical monetary policies such as those adopted in advanced economies (AEs). The flexible inflation targeting pursued by most AE central banks entails tightening monetary...

Consumer price inflation in the United States registered 8.2 percent in April 2022, as measured by the consumer price index (CPI). Core CPI inflation, which excludes the costs of energy and food, printed at 6.1 percent. These are the highest rates since the early 1980s, and have understandably...

This paper develops an empirical model of the economic impact of COVID-19 and uses it to gauge how the evolution of the pandemic will affect the global economic recovery.

The emerging-market and developing economies face a multitude of grave challenges as they confront the COVID-19 pandemic, including a critical lack of budgetary space. Observers have highlighted the need to bolster the international financial institutions' lending capacity in the event of a...