The authors analyze the welfare implications of simple monetary policy rules in the context of an estimated model of a small open economy for Canada with traded and non-traded goods, and with sticky prices and wages.
In the United States, the Federal Reserve has a dual mandate of promoting stable inflation and maximum employment. Since the Fed directly controls only one instrument - the federal funds rate - the authors argue that the Fed's priorities continuously alternate between inflation and economic activity.
The author provides an overview of the 1975–78 Anti-Inflation Program (AIP), in a background document prepared for a seminar organized by the Bank of Canada to mark the AIP's 30th anniversary.
In two recent papers, Jensen (2002) and Walsh (2003), using a hybrid New Keynesian model, demonstrate that a regime that targets either nominal income growth or the change in the output gap can effectively replicate the outcome under commitment and hence reduce the size of the stabilization bias.
The authors construct three financial conditions indexes (FCIs) for Canada based on three approaches: an IS-curve-based model, generalized impulse-response functions, and factor analysis.