IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/zbw/ifwkwp/337.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

A k-percent rule for monetary policy in West Germany

Author

Listed:
  • Scheide, Joachim

Abstract

The concept of rules for monetary policy has been more and more critized in recent years. The Deutsche Bundesbank is also urged to give up monetary targeting. The idea is that the economic performance could be improved if monetary policy became more pragmatic and was more concerned about slow growth and high unemployment. In reality, however, monetary policy in the past decades has been highly unstable and has thus contributed to business cycle fluctuations and inflation. The intended policy oriented at the production potential has not been followed in West Germany. In this paper, a simple model is used to analyze what could have been expected from a rule similar to the one the Bundesbank has intended to pursue since 1974. The simulations for the period 1972-1987 show that strict application of a k-percent rule would have implied less pronounced cyclical fluctuations of domestic demand and a stable price level on average. This result contradicts the view that rules for monetary policy are useless or even counterproductive.

Suggested Citation

  • Scheide, Joachim, 1988. "A k-percent rule for monetary policy in West Germany," Kiel Working Papers 337, Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel).
    • Handle: RePEc:zbw:ifwkwp:337
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/491/1/042029368.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Barro, Robert J & Gordon, David B, 1983. "A Positive Theory of Monetary Policy in a Natural Rate Model," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 91(4), pages 589-610, August.
    2. Kormendi, Roger C. & Meguire, Philip G., 1985. "Macroeconomic determinants of growth: Cross-country evidence," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 16(2), pages 141-163, September.
    3. Kydland, Finn E & Prescott, Edward C, 1977. "Rules Rather Than Discretion: The Inconsistency of Optimal Plans," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 85(3), pages 473-491, June.
    4. Scheide, Joachim, 1984. "Geldpolitik, Konjunktur und rationale Erwartungen," Open Access Publications from Kiel Institute for the World Economy 378, Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel).
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Joachim Scheide, 1989. "A K-percent rule for monetary policy in West Germany," Review of World Economics (Weltwirtschaftliches Archiv), Springer;Institut für Weltwirtschaft (Kiel Institute for the World Economy), vol. 125(2), pages 326-336, June.
    2. Scheide, Joachim, 1989. "On real and monetary explanations of business cycles in West Germany," Kiel Working Papers 356, Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel).
    3. Loungani, Prakash & Sheets, Nathan, 1997. "Central Bank Independence, Inflation, and Growth in Transition Economies," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 29(3), pages 381-399, August.
    4. Martha López, 2006. "Algunos Criterios Para Evaluar Una Meta De Inflación De Largo Plazo," Borradores de Economia 1967, Banco de la Republica.
    5. Cukierman, Alex & Lippi, Francesco, 2001. "Labour Markets and Monetary Union: A Strategic Analysis," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 111(473), pages 541-565, July.
    6. Bill Dupor, 2005. "Keynesian Conundrum: Multiplicity and Time Consistent Stabilization," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 8(1), pages 154-177, January.
    7. Alex Cukierman & Anton Muscatelli, 2001. "Do Central Banks have Precautionary Demands for Expansions and for Price Stability?," Working Papers 2002_4, Business School - Economics, University of Glasgow, revised Mar 2002.
    8. Corinne Aaron-Cureau & Hubert Kempf, 2006. "Bargaining over monetary policy in a monetary union and the case for appointing an independent central banker," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 58(1), pages 1-27, January.
    9. Martin, Fernando M., 2015. "Debt, inflation and central bank independence," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 79(C), pages 129-150.
    10. Fabrice Capoen & Henri Sterdyniak & Pierre Villa, 1994. "Indépendance des banques centrales, politiques monétaire et budgétaire : une approche stratégique," Revue de l'OFCE, Programme National Persée, vol. 50(1), pages 65-102.
    11. Pierpaolo Benigno & Luca Antonio Ricci, 2011. "The Inflation-Output Trade-Off with Downward Wage Rigidities," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(4), pages 1436-1466, June.
    12. Bordo, Michael D., 1986. "Explorations in monetary history: A survey of the literature," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 23(4), pages 339-415, October.
    13. Bennett T. McCallum & Edward Nelson, 2004. "Timeless perspective vs. discretionary monetary policy in forward-looking models," Review, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, vol. 86(Mar), pages 43-56.
    14. Nessen, Marianne & Vestin, David, 2005. "Average Inflation Targeting," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 37(5), pages 837-863, October.
    15. Aurélien Goutsmedt, 2021. "From the Stagflation to the Great Inflation: Explaining the US economy of the 1970s," Revue d'économie politique, Dalloz, vol. 131(3), pages 557-582.
    16. Christoph S. Weber, 2020. "The unemployment effect of central bank transparency," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 59(6), pages 2947-2975, December.
    17. Berlemann, Michael & Hielscher, Kai, 2009. "Measuring Effective Monetary Policy Conservatism," Working Paper 89/2009, Helmut Schmidt University, Hamburg.
    18. Richard Mash, 2000. "The Time Inconsistency of Monetary Policy with Inflation Persistence," Economics Series Working Papers 15, University of Oxford, Department of Economics.
    19. Cavallari, Lilia, 2001. "Inflationary performance in a monetary union with large wage setters," ZEI Working Papers B 11-2001, University of Bonn, ZEI - Center for European Integration Studies.
    20. Jordi Galí & Mark Gertler, 2007. "Macroeconomic Modeling for Monetary Policy Evaluation," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 21(4), pages 25-46, Fall.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:zbw:ifwkwp:337. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/iwkiede.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.