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How Important is Money in the Conduct of Monetary Policy?

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  • Michael Woodford

    () (Columbia University)

Abstract

This paper was presented as the 2006 W.A. Mackintosh Lecture at Queen's University. I consider some of the leading arguments for assigning an important role to tracking the growth of monetary aggregates when making decisions about monetary policy. First, I consider whether ignoring money means returning to the conceptual framework that allowed the high inflation of the 1970s. Second, I consider whether models of inflation determination with no role for money are incomplete, or inconsistent with elementary economic principles. Third, I consider the implications for monetary policy strategy of the empirical evidence for a long­run relationship between money growth and inflation. (Here I give particular attention to the implications of "two-­pillar Phillips curves" of the kind proposed by Gerlach (2003).) And fourth, I consider reasons why a monetary policy strategy based solely on short-­run inflation forecasts derived from a Phillips curve may not be a reliable way of controlling inflation. I argue that none of these considerations provide a compelling reason to assign a prominent role to monetary aggregates in the conduct of monetary policy.

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File URL: http://qed.econ.queensu.ca/working_papers/papers/qed_wp_1104.pdf
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Bibliographic Info

Paper provided by Queen's University, Department of Economics in its series Working Papers with number 1104.

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Length: 51 pages
Date of creation: Oct 2006
Date of revision:
Handle: RePEc:qed:wpaper:1104

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Keywords: inflation; Phillips curve; monetary policy;

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