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Did the Great Inflation occur despite policymaker commitment to a Taylor rule?

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Abstract

We study the hypothesis that misperceptions of trend productivity growth during the onset of the productivity slowdown in the U.S. caused much of the great inflation of the 1970s. We use the general equilibrium, sticky price framework of Woodford (2003), augmented with learning using the techniques of Evans and Honkapohja (2001). We allow for endogenous investment as well as explicit, exogenous growth in productivity and the labor input. We assume the monetary policymaker is committed to using a Taylortype policy rule. We study how this economy reacts to an unexpected change in the trend productivity growth rate under learning. We find that a substantial portion of the observed increase in inflation during the 1970s can be attributed to this source.

Suggested Citation

  • James B. Bullard & Stefano Eusepi, 2004. "Did the Great Inflation occur despite policymaker commitment to a Taylor rule?," Working Papers 2003-013, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis.
    • Handle: RePEc:fip:fedlwp:2003-013
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Monetary policy; Productivity;

    JEL classification:

    • E4 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Money and Interest Rates
    • E5 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit

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