IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/fip/fedgfe/2025-42.html

Changing Jobs to Fight Inflation: Labor Market Reactions to Inflationary Shocks

Author

Abstract

We argue that inflationary shocks affect allocative efficiency by changing the rate and the characteristics of workers’ job-to-job transitions. First, using monetary policy shocks and survey data on search effort, we empirically show that a one percentage point rise in inflation increases job-to-job transitions by up to 4.5%, and workers with higher inflation expectations are more likely to search and do so more effectively. Second, we build a general equilibrium model of directed on-the-job search to quantify the aggregate implications of labor market reactions. Higher-than-expected inflation reduces real wages, prompting workers to search more actively and aim lower. This increases job-to-job transitions but lowers the efficiency gains per transition. Therefore, the effect on output is ambiguous. Last, we calibrate the model to the U.S. economy. Inflationary shocks increase reallocation rates, yet allocative efficiency and output decline. Small deflationary shocks (e.g., 2%) increase output in the short run, while others decrease it.

Suggested Citation

  • Gorkem Bostanci & Omer Koru & Sergio Villalvazo, 2025. "Changing Jobs to Fight Inflation: Labor Market Reactions to Inflationary Shocks," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2025-042, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    • Handle: RePEc:fip:fedgfe:2025-42
    DOI: 10.17016/FEDS.2025.042
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/feds/files/2025042pap.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.17016/FEDS.2025.042?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
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Christina D. Romer & David H. Romer, 2004. "A New Measure of Monetary Shocks: Derivation and Implications," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 94(4), pages 1055-1084, September.
    2. Druant, Martine & Fabiani, Silvia & Kezdi, Gabor & Lamo, Ana & Martins, Fernando & Sabbatini, Roberto, 2012. "Firms' price and wage adjustment in Europe: Survey evidence on nominal stickiness," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 19(5), pages 772-782.
    3. Mark Gertler & Peter Karadi, 2015. "Monetary Policy Surprises, Credit Costs, and Economic Activity," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 7(1), pages 44-76, January.
    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. Viet Hoang Dinh & Didier Nibbering & Benjamin Wong, 2023. "Random Subspace Local Projections," CAMA Working Papers 2023-34, Centre for Applied Macroeconomic Analysis, Crawford School of Public Policy, The Australian National University.
    2. Cristiano Cantore & Filippo Ferroni & Miguel León-Ledesma, 2021. "The Missing Link: Monetary Policy and The Labor Share," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 19(3), pages 1592-1620.
    3. Bu, Chunya & Rogers, John & Wu, Wenbin, 2021. "A unified measure of Fed monetary policy shocks," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 118(C), pages 331-349.
    4. Vedolin, Andrea & Leombroni, Matteo & , & Whelan, Paul, 2018. "Central Bank Communication and the Yield Curve," CEPR Discussion Papers 12970, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    5. Chen Lian & Yueran Ma & Carmen Wang, 2019. "Low Interest Rates and Risk-Taking: Evidence from Individual Investment Decisions," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 32(6), pages 2107-2148.
    6. Nihar Shah, 2022. "Doubly heterogeneous monetary spillovers," International Finance, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 25(2), pages 126-150, August.
    7. Tatjana Dahlhaus & Luca Gambetti, 2018. "Noisy Monetary Policy," Staff Working Papers 18-23, Bank of Canada.
    8. Bennani, Hamza, 2023. "Effect of monetary policy shocks on the racial unemployment rates in the US," Economic Systems, Elsevier, vol. 47(1).
    9. Chen, Zhengyang & Valcarcel, Victor J., 2021. "Monetary transmission in money markets: The not-so-elusive missing piece of the puzzle," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 131(C).
    10. Alina K. Bartscher & Moritz Kuhn & Moritz Schularick & Paul Wachtel, 2022. "Monetary Policy and Racial Inequality," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 53(1 (Spring), pages 1-63.
    11. Lee, Seungyoon & Park, Jongwook, 2022. "Identifying monetary policy shocks using economic forecasts in Korea," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 111(C).
    12. Max Breitenlechner & Martin Geiger & Mathias Klein, 2024. "The Fiscal Channel of Monetary Policy," Working Papers 2024-07, Faculty of Economics and Statistics, Universität Innsbruck.
    13. Metiu, Norbert & Prieto, Esteban, 2025. "Time-varying stock return correlation, news shocks, and business cycles," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 172(C).
    14. Alexander Mechanick & Jacob P. Weber, 2024. "The Countercyclical Benefits of Regulatory Costs," Staff Reports 1109, Federal Reserve Bank of New York.
    15. Isabel Gödl-Hanisch, 2023. "Bank Concentration and Monetary Policy Pass-Through," CESifo Working Paper Series 10378, CESifo.
    16. Robin Braun & Ralf Brüggemann, 2017. "Identification of SVAR Models by Combining Sign Restrictions With External Instruments," Working Paper Series of the Department of Economics, University of Konstanz 2017-07, Department of Economics, University of Konstanz.
    17. Ettmeier, Stephanie & Kriwoluzky, Alexander, 2019. "Same, but different? Testing monetary policy shock measures," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 184(C).
    18. Guido Ascari & Timo Haber, 2019. "Sticky prices and the transmission mechanism of monetary policy: A minimal test of New Keynesian models," Economics Series Working Papers 869, University of Oxford, Department of Economics.
    19. Bernoth, Kerstin & Herwartz, Helmut & Trienens, Lasse, 2024. "Interest Rates, Convenience Yields and Inflation Expectations: Drivers of US Dollar Exchange Rates," VfS Annual Conference 2024 (Berlin): Upcoming Labor Market Challenges 302351, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association, revised 2024.
    20. Rüth, Sebastian K., 2017. "State-dependent monetary policy transmission and financial market tensions," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 157(C), pages 56-61.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;

    JEL classification:

    • E24 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Employment; Unemployment; Wages; Intergenerational Income Distribution; Aggregate Human Capital; Aggregate Labor Productivity
    • E31 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Price Level; Inflation; Deflation
    • J31 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Wages, Compensation, and Labor Costs - - - Wage Level and Structure; Wage Differentials

    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:fedgfe:2025-42. 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: Ryan Wolfslayer ; Keisha Fournillier (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/frbgvus.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.