IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/fip/fedbwp/99602.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Monetary Policy and the Distribution of Income: Evidence from U.S. Metropolitan Areas

Author

Abstract

We use Zip code–level Statistics of Income data from the Internal Revenue Service to measure the distribution of income within U.S. metropolitan areas from 1998 through 2019. Exploiting geographic variation in income distribution over time, we study how unanticipated changes in the monetary policy stance shape the subsequent dynamics of income inequality. The results show that monetary policy persistently affects labor income inequality and that these distributional effects are amplified significantly in weak local labor markets.

Suggested Citation

  • Giovanni Favara & Francesca Loria & Egon Zakrajšek, 2025. "Monetary Policy and the Distribution of Income: Evidence from U.S. Metropolitan Areas," Working Papers 25-1, Federal Reserve Bank of Boston.
  • Handle: RePEc:fip:fedbwp:99602
    DOI: 10.29412/res.wp.2025.01
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.bostonfed.org/publications/research-department-working-paper/2025/monetary-policy-and-the-distribution-of-income-evidence-from-us-metropolitan-areas.aspx
    File Function: Summary
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://www.bostonfed.org/-/media/Documents/Workingpapers/PDF/2025/WP2501.pdf
    File Function: Full text
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.29412/res.wp.2025.01?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Kuttner, Kenneth N., 2001. "Monetary policy surprises and interest rates: Evidence from the Fed funds futures market," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 47(3), pages 523-544, June.
    2. Jonathan Heathcote & Fabrizio Perri & Gianluca Violante, 2020. "The Rise of US Earnings Inequality: Does the Cycle Drive the Trend?," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 37, pages 181-204, August.
    3. Nittai K. Bergman & David Matsa & Michael Weber & Michael Weber, 2022. "Inclusive Monetary Policy: How Tight Labor Markets Facilitate Broad-Based Employment Growth," CESifo Working Paper Series 9512, CESifo.
    4. James D. Hamilton, 2018. "Why You Should Never Use the Hodrick-Prescott Filter," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 100(5), pages 831-843, December.
    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. Jake D. Orchard, 2025. "Non-homothetic Demand Shifts and Inflation Inequality," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2025-085, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    2. Choi, Sangyup & Willems, Tim & Yoo, Seung Yong, 2024. "Revisiting the monetary transmission mechanism through an industry-level differential approach," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 145(C).
    3. Marco Bellifemine & Adrien Couturier & Rustam Jamilov, 2023. "The Regional Keynesian Cross," Discussion Papers 2311, Centre for Macroeconomics (CFM).
    4. Marco Bellifemine & Adrien Couturier & Rustam Jamilov, 2022. "The Regional Keynesian Cross," Economics Series Working Papers 995, University of Oxford, Department of Economics.
    5. Marjan Petreski & Stefan Tanevski & Alejandro D. Jacobo, 2024. "Monetary Policy and the Gendered Labor Market Dynamics: Evidence from Developing Economies," Papers 2402.05729, arXiv.org.
    6. Wilson, Matthew S., 2020. "A real business cycle model with money as a sunspot variable," Journal of Economics and Business, Elsevier, vol. 109(C).
    7. Federico Ravenna & Carl E. Walshy, 2024. "Inclusive Monetary Policy in a Model with Heterogeneous Workers," Carlo Alberto Notebooks 734 JEL Classification: E, Collegio Carlo Alberto.
    8. Canova, Fabio, 2020. "FAQ: How do I measure the Output gap?," CEPR Discussion Papers 14943, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    9. Juan Camilo Galvis Ciro & Juan Camilo Anzoátegui Zapata, 2018. "Announcements credibility and government securities: evidence from Colombia," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 25(4), pages 278-282, February.
    10. Alexandra Piller & Marc Schranz & Larissa Schwaller, 2025. "Using Natural Language Processing to Identify Monetary Policy Shocks," Working Papers 25.05, Swiss National Bank, Study Center Gerzensee.
    11. Carlo Rosa & Giovanni Verga, 2006. "The Impact of Central Bank Announcements on Asset Prices in Real Time: Testing the Efficiency of the Euribor Futures Market," CEP Discussion Papers dp0764, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
    12. Marfatia, Hardik A., 2015. "Monetary policy's time-varying impact on the US bond markets: Role of financial stress and risks," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 34(C), pages 103-123.
    13. Pulapre Balakrishnan & M Parameswaran, 2019. "Modeling the Dynamics of Inflation in India," Working Papers 16, Ashoka University, Department of Economics.
    14. Hertrich Markus, 2019. "A Novel Housing Price Misalignment Indicator for Germany," German Economic Review, De Gruyter, vol. 20(4), pages 759-794, December.
    15. Owolabi, Adegboyega O. & Berdiev, Aziz N. & Saunoris, James W., 2022. "Is the shadow economy procyclical or countercyclical over the business cycle? International evidence," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 84(C), pages 257-270.
    16. Ekaterina Pirozhkova & Nicola Viegi, 2024. "The Bank Lending Channel of Monetary Policy Transmission in South Africa," Working Papers 202443, University of Pretoria, Department of Economics.
    17. Jinjarak, Yothin, 2014. "Equity prices and financial globalization," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 33(C), pages 49-57.
    18. Claus Brand & Daniel Buncic & Jarkko Turunen, 2010. "The Impact of ECB Monetary Policy Decisions and Communication on the Yield Curve," Journal of the European Economic Association, MIT Press, vol. 8(6), pages 1266-1298, December.
    19. Francesco Simone Lucidi, 2019. "Real-time signals anticipating credit booms in Euro Area countries," Working Papers in Public Economics 189, Department of Economics and Law, Sapienza University of Roma.
    20. Duran, Murat & Özcan, Gülserim & Özlü, Pınar & Ünalmış, Deren, 2012. "Measuring the impact of monetary policy on asset prices in Turkey," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 114(1), pages 29-31.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    JEL classification:

    • E21 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Consumption; Saving; Wealth
    • E52 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit - - - Monetary Policy
    • E58 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit - - - Central Banks and Their Policies

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:fip:fedbwp:99602. 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: Catherine Spozio (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/frbbous.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.