We propose that the formation of beliefs be treated as statistical hypothesis tests, and label such beliefs inferential expectations. If a belief is overturned through the build-up of evidence, we assume agents switch to the rational expectation. We build a state dependent Phillips curve, and...

Movements in commodity prices can have large effects on output and inflation. From both an academic and policy perspective, changes in commodity prices relative to the prices of services and manufactured goods pose a number of important questions. First, what are the fundamental processes or...

We introduce inventories into an otherwise standard New Keynesian model and study the implications for inflation dynamics. Inventory holdings are motivated as a means to generate sales for demand-constrained firms. We derive various representa- tions of the New Keynesian Phillips curve with...

Expanded public availability of U.S. banking data has prompted a need to reexamine end-of-quarter window dressing. We find substantial heterogeneity in the pattern of window dressing across banks and products, not all of which can be explained as customerinitiated, and some of which is...

In an influential paper, Engel and West (2005) claim that the near random-walk behavior of nominal exchange rates is an equilibrium outcome of a variant of present-value models when economic fundamentals follow exogenous first-order integrated processes and the discount factor approaches one....

This paper presents the novel implications of introducing price rigidities into a model of good-specific habit formation, for the response of private consumption following a positive government spending shock. With ’deep’ habits in demand, the price elasticity of demand rises after the...

The sending of remittances is a decentralised decision of migrant workers, nevertheless it has its macroeconomic implication in providing insurance against domestic output shocks in the recipient economies – a phenomenon known in literature as risk sharing. Using a large sample of 86...

The United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has begun regulating existing stationary sources of greenhouse gases (GHG) using its authority under the Clean Air Act (the Act). The regulatory process under the Act is long and involved and raises the prospect that significant U.S. action...

The global financial crisis of 2008 was a crisis affecting both the financial sector and the “real economy”. This paper analyzes the transmission of unexpected shocks from the financial sector in the US to other countries and sectors. We test the hypothesis that the financial crisis spread...

An important requirement, prior to countries’ adopting a common currency or maintaining an independent monetary policy, is establishing the extent to which they share a common economic cycle and how susceptible they are to region-specific shocks. For example, Kouparitsas (2001) has examined...