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What Matters in Households' Inflation Expectations?

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  • Andrade, Philippe
  • Gautier, Erwan
  • Mengus, Eric

Abstract

We provide evidence that households discretize their inflation expectations so that what matters for durable consumption decisions is the broad inflation regime they expect. Using survey data, we document that a large share of the adjustment in the average inflation expectation comes from the change in the share of households expecting stable prices; these households also consume relatively less than the ones expecting positive inflation. In contrast, variations of expectations across households expecting a positive inflation rate are associated with much smaller differences in individual durable consumption choices. We illustrate how this mitigates the expectation channel of monetary policy.

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  • Andrade, Philippe & Gautier, Erwan & Mengus, Eric, 2020. "What Matters in Households' Inflation Expectations?," CEPR Discussion Papers 14905, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
  • Handle: RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:14905
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    Cited by:

    1. Weber, Michael & Gorodnichenko, Yuriy & Coibion, Olivier, 2022. "The Expected, Perceived, and Realized Inflation of U.S. Households before and during the COVID-19 Pandemic," IZA Discussion Papers 15027, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    2. Philippe Andrade & Jordi Gali & Hervé Le Bihan & Julien Matheron, 2021. "Should the ECB Adjust Its Strategy in the Face of a Lower r*?," Working Papers 22-1, Federal Reserve Bank of Boston.
    3. Yuriy Gorodnichenko & Dmitriy Sergeyev, 2021. "Zero Lower Bound on Inflation Expectations," NBER Working Papers 29496, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. repec:zbw:bofrdp:2021_010 is not listed on IDEAS
    5. Gabriele Galati & Richhild Moessner & Maarten van Rooij, 2020. "The anchoring of long-term inflation expectations of consumers: insights from a new survey," Working Papers 688, DNB.
    6. Coleman, Winnie & Nautz, Dieter, 2021. "Inflation expectations, inflation target credibility and the COVID-19 pandemic: New evidence from Germany," Discussion Papers 2021/12, Free University Berlin, School of Business & Economics.
    7. Stanisławska, Ewa & Paloviita, Maritta, 2021. "Medium- vs. short-term consumer inflation expectations: Evidence from a new euro area survey," Bank of Finland Research Discussion Papers 10/2021, Bank of Finland.
    8. Frédérique Savignac & Erwan Gautier & Yuriy Gorodnichenko & Olivier Coibion, 2021. "Firms' Inflation Expectations: New Evidence from France," NBER Working Papers 29376, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    9. Stanisławska, Ewa & Paloviita, Maritta, 2021. "Responsiveness of consumers' medium-term inflation expectations : evidence from a new euro area survey," Research Discussion Papers 10/2021, Bank of Finland.
    10. Andrade, Philippe & Galí, Jordi & Le Bihan, Hervé & Matheron, Julien, 2021. "Should the ECB adjust its strategy in the face of a lower r★?," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 132(C).
    11. Gabriele Galati & Richhild Moessner & Maarten van Rooij, 2022. "Reactions of household inflation expectations to a symmetric inflation target and high inflation (August 2022 update)," Working Papers 743, DNB.
    12. Anat Bracha & Jenny Tang, 2022. "Inflation Levels and (In)Attention," Working Papers 22-4, Federal Reserve Bank of Boston.
    13. Baumann, Ursel & Darracq Pariès, Matthieu & Westermann, Thomas & Riggi, Marianna & Bobeica, Elena & Meyler, Aidan & Böninghausen, Benjamin & Fritzer, Friedrich & Trezzi, Riccardo & Jonckheere, Jana & , 2021. "Inflation expectations and their role in Eurosystem forecasting," Occasional Paper Series 264, European Central Bank.
    14. Assenmacher, Katrin & Glöckler, Gabriel & Holton, Sarah & Trautmann, Peter & Ioannou, Demosthenes & Mee, Simon & Alonso, Conception & Argiri, Eleni & Arigoni, Filippo & Bakk-Simon, Klára & Bergbauer, , 2021. "Clear, consistent and engaging: ECB monetary policy communication in a changing world," Occasional Paper Series 274, European Central Bank.
    15. Coleman, Winnie & Nautz, Dieter, 2021. "Inflation expectations, inflation target credibility and the COVID-19 pandemic: New evidence from Germany," CFS Working Paper Series 658, Center for Financial Studies (CFS).
    16. Bańnkowska, Katarzyna & Borlescu, Ana Maria & Charalambakis, Evangelos & Da Silva, António Dias & Di Laurea, Davide & Dossche, Maarten & Georgarakos, Dimitris & Honkkila, Juha & Kennedy, Neale & Kenny, 2021. "ECB Consumer Expectations Survey: an overview and first evaluation," Occasional Paper Series 287, European Central Bank.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    adjustment costs; Euler Equation; imperfect information; Inflation expectations; Stabilization policies; survey data;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D12 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - Consumer Economics: Empirical Analysis
    • D84 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Expectations; Speculations
    • E21 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Consumption; Saving; Wealth
    • E31 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Price Level; Inflation; Deflation
    • E52 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit - - - Monetary Policy

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