IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/elg/rokejn/v7y2019i2p151-170.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The fallacy of the natural rate of interest and zero lower bound economics: why negative interest rates may not remedy Keynesian unemployment

Author

Listed:
  • Thomas I. Palley

    (Independent analyst, Washington, DC, USA)

Abstract

This paper provides a critique of zero lower bound (ZLB) economics which has become the new orthodoxy for explaining stagnation. ZLB economics is an extension of pre-Keynesian economics which attributes macroeconomic dysfunction to rigidities and market imperfections. The ZLB is the latest rigidity in that pre-Keynesian tradition. The paper argues negative nominal interest rates, even if feasible, may be unable to remedy Keynesian demand shortage unemployment, and might even aggravate the problem. That is because there exist non-reproduced assets whose return dominates that of investment, and saving may also increase in response to negative rates. Consequently, there may be no natural rate of interest.

Suggested Citation

  • Thomas I. Palley, 2019. "The fallacy of the natural rate of interest and zero lower bound economics: why negative interest rates may not remedy Keynesian unemployment," Review of Keynesian Economics, Edward Elgar Publishing, vol. 7(2), pages 151-170, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:elg:rokejn:v:7:y:2019:i:2:p151-170
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.elgaronline.com/view/journals/roke/7-2/roke.2019.02.03.xml
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Citera, Emanuele & Sau, Lino, 2019. "Complexity, Conventions and Instability: the role of monetary policy," Department of Economics and Statistics Cognetti de Martiis. Working Papers 201924, University of Turin.
    2. Andrea Borsato, 2022. "An agent-based model for Secular Stagnation in the USA: theory and empirical evidence," Journal of Evolutionary Economics, Springer, vol. 32(4), pages 1345-1389, September.
    3. Massimo Pivetti, 2019. "On Interest as a Monetary Phenomenon and the ‘Best’ Interest-rate Policy," Bulletin of Political Economy, Bulletin of Political Economy, vol. 13(2), pages 167-187, December.
    4. Stamegna, Marco, 2022. "A Kaleckian growth model of secular stagnation with induced innovation," MPRA Paper 113794, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    5. Ogawa, Shogo, 2022. "Survey of non-Walrasian disequilibrium economic theory," MPRA Paper 115011, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    6. Jan Willem van den End & Paul Konietschke & Anna Samarina & Irina M. Stanga, 2020. "Macroeconomic reversal rate: evidence from a nonlinear IS-curve," Working Papers 684, DNB.
    7. van den End, Jan Willem & Konietschke, Paul & Samarina, Anna & Stanga, Irina M., 2021. "Macroeconomic reversal rate in a low interest rate environment," Working Paper Series 2620, European Central Bank.
    8. Stefano Di Bucchianico, 2021. "Negative Interest Rate Policy to Fight Secular Stagnation: Unfeasible, Ineffective, Irrelevant, or Inadequate?," Review of Political Economy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 33(4), pages 687-710, October.
    9. Shogo Ogawa & Hiroaki Sasaki, 2022. "Numerical analysis of the disequilibrium monetary growth model: secular stagnation, slow convergence, and cyclical fluctuations," Evolutionary and Institutional Economics Review, Springer, vol. 19(1), pages 369-394, April.
    10. Bossone Biagio, 2022. "The Portfolio Theory of Inflation and Policy (in)Effectiveness: Exploring it Further and Righting the Wrongs," Economics - The Open-Access, Open-Assessment Journal, De Gruyter, vol. 16(1), pages 257-275, January.
    11. Ogawa, Shogo, 2022. "Monetary growth with disequilibrium: A non-Walrasian baseline model," Structural Change and Economic Dynamics, Elsevier, vol. 62(C), pages 512-528.
    12. Andrea Borsato, 2021. "Does the Secular Stagnation hypothesis match with data? Evidence from USA," Working Papers of BETA 2021-11, Bureau d'Economie Théorique et Appliquée, UDS, Strasbourg.
    13. Manuel David Cruz & Daniele Tavani, 2022. "Secular Stagnation: A Classical-Marxian View," Working Papers PKWP2229, Post Keynesian Economics Society (PKES).
    14. Di Bucchianico, Stefano, 2020. "Discussing Secular Stagnation: A case for freeing good ideas from theoretical constraints?," Structural Change and Economic Dynamics, Elsevier, vol. 55(C), pages 288-297.
    15. Di Bucchianico, Stefano, 2021. "Inequality, household debt, ageing and bubbles: A model of demand-side Secular Stagnation," IPE Working Papers 160/2021, Berlin School of Economics and Law, Institute for International Political Economy (IPE).
    16. Bossone, Biagio, 2019. "The portfolio theory of inflation and policy (in)effectiveness," Economics - The Open-Access, Open-Assessment E-Journal (2007-2020), Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel), vol. 13, pages 1-25.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    zero lower bound (ZLB); natural rate of interest; non-reproduced assets; stagnation; New Keynesianism; nominal rigidities;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • E0 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - General
    • E10 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - General Aggregative Models - - - General
    • E12 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - General Aggregative Models - - - Keynes; Keynesian; Post-Keynesian; Modern Monetary Theory
    • E20 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - General (includes Measurement and Data)
    • E40 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Money and Interest Rates - - - General
    • E50 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit - - - General

    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:elg:rokejn:v:7:y:2019:i:2:p151-170. 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.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using 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: Phillip Thompson (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elgaronline.com/roke .

    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.