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Incentive schemes for central bankers under uncertainty: inflation targets versus contracts

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Author Info
Eric Schaling
Marco Hoeberichts
Sylvester Eijffinger

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Abstract

The implications of uncertain policy preferences for the targeting and contracting approaches to monetary policy are investigated. It is shown that, in the presence of uncertain preferences, a linear incentive contract in the sense of Walsh performs better than an explicit inflation target as proposed by Svensson. The reason is that an inflation target produces a higher variance of inflation. It is also shown that itis optimal to offer a linear inflation contract that does not depend on the degree of preference uncertainty.

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Paper provided by Bank of England in its series Bank of England working papers with number 88.

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Handle: RePEc:boe:boeewp:88

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Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:

  1. Brunner, Allan D & Hess, Gregory D, 1993. "Are Higher Levels of Inflation Less Predictable? A State-Dependent Conditional Heteroscedasticity Approach," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 11(2), pages 187-97, April.
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  2. Rogoff, Kenneth, 1985. "The Optimal Degree of Commitment to an Intermediate Monetary Target," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 100(4), pages 1169-89, November. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  3. Bennett T. McCallum, 1995. "Two Fallacies Concerning Central Bank Independence," NBER Working Papers 5075, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  4. Laurence Ball & Stephen G. Cecchetti, 1990. "Inflation and Uncertainty at Long and Short Horizons," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 21(1990-1), pages 215-254. [Downloadable!]
  5. Svensson, Lars E O, 1995. "Optimal Inflation Targets, 'Conservative' Central Banks, and Linear Inflation Contracts," CEPR Discussion Papers 1249, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  6. Walsh, Carl E, 1995. "Optimal Contracts for Central Bankers," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 85(1), pages 150-67, March. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  7. Cukierman, Alex & Meltzer, Allan H, 1986. "A Theory of Ambiguity, Credibility, and Inflation under Discretion and Asymmetric Information," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 54(5), pages 1099-1128, September. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  8. Charles Nolan & Eric Schaling, . "Monetary Policy Uncertainty and Central Bank Accountability," Bank of England working papers 54, Bank of England.
  9. Cukierman, Alex & Wachtel, Paul, 1979. "Differential Inflationary Expectations and the Variability of the Rate of Inflation: Theory and Evidence," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 69(4), pages 595-609, September. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  10. Herrendorf, Berthold & Lockwood, Ben, 1997. "Rogoff's "Conservative" Central Banker Restored," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 29(4), pages 476-95, November.
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  11. Beetsma, Roel M W J & Jensen, Henrik, 1998. "Inflation Targets and Contracts with Uncertain Central Banker Preferences," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 30(3), pages 384-403, August.
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  12. Persson, Torsten & Tabellini, Guido, 1993. "Designing institutions for monetary stability," Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(1), pages 53-84, December. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  13. Eijffinger, S-C-W & de Haan, J, 1996. "The Political Economy of Central-Bank Independence," Princeton Studies in International Economics 19, International Economics Section, Departement of Economics Princeton University,.
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  14. Davis, George & Kanago, Bryce, 1998. "High and Uncertain Inflation: Results from a New Data Set," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 30(2), pages 218-30, May.
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Cited by:
(explanations, Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.)

  1. Georgios E. Chortareas & Stephen M. Miller, 2002. "Central Banker Contracts, Incomplete Information, and Monetary Policy Surprises: In Search of a Selfish Central Banker?," Working papers 2002-29, University of Connecticut, Department of Economics. [Downloadable!]
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  2. Sénégas, Marc-Alexandre & Vilmunen, Jouko, 1999. "The Effects of Transmission Uncertainty on the Flexibility-Credibility Tradeoff in Monetary Policy," Research Discussion Papers 14/1999, Bank of Finland. [Downloadable!]
  3. Richard Mash, 2000. "The Time Inconsistency of Monetary Policy with Inflation Persistence," Economics Series Working Papers 015, University of Oxford, Department of Economics. [Downloadable!]
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