IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/hal/journl/hal-01533519.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Optimal term length for an overconfident central banker

Author

Listed:
  • Etienne Farvaque

    (LEM - Lille économie management - UMR 9221 - UA - Université d'Artois - UCL - Université catholique de Lille - Université de Lille - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique)

  • Norimichi Matsueda

Abstract

This paper discusses the implications of overconfidence when it affects a monetary policy maker. We consider two forms of overconfidence: the illusion of precision and the illusion of control. Incorporating them into a standard New Keynesian framework, we consider the optimal term length of a central banker and examine how it depends on the types and degrees of overconfidence. In particular, we show that the legal mandate should always be lengthened when these two types of biases increase by the same percentage magnitude.

Suggested Citation

  • Etienne Farvaque & Norimichi Matsueda, 2017. "Optimal term length for an overconfident central banker," Post-Print hal-01533519, HAL.
    • Handle: RePEc:hal:journl:hal-01533519
    DOI: 10.1142/s0217590816500107
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    To our knowledge, this item is not available for download. To find whether it is available, there are three options:
    1. Check below whether another version of this item is available online.
    2. Check on the provider's web page whether it is in fact available.
    3. Perform a search for a similarly titled item that would be available.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Terrance Odean., 1996. "Volume, Volatility, Price and Profit When All Trader Are Above Average," Research Program in Finance Working Papers RPF-266, University of California at Berkeley.
    2. Mark Gertler & Jordi Gali & Richard Clarida, 1999. "The Science of Monetary Policy: A New Keynesian Perspective," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 37(4), pages 1661-1707, December.
    3. Waller, Christopher J, 1991. "Bashing and Coercion in Monetary Policy," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 29(1), pages 1-13, January.
    4. Stefano DellaVigna, 2009. "Psychology and Economics: Evidence from the Field," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 47(2), pages 315-372, June.
    5. Carl E. Walsh, 2010. "Monetary Theory and Policy, Third Edition," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 3, volume 1, number 0262013770, December.
    6. Pietro Ortoleva & Erik Snowberg, 2015. "Overconfidence in Political Behavior," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 105(2), pages 504-535, February.
    7. Fast, Nathanael J. & Sivanathan, Niro & Mayer, Nicole D. & Galinsky, Adam D., 2012. "Power and overconfident decision-making," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 117(2), pages 249-260.
    8. Klomp, Jeroen & de Haan, Jakob, 2010. "Do central bank law reforms affect the term in office of central bank governors?," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 106(3), pages 219-222, March.
    9. Christopher Crowe & Ellen E. Meade, 2007. "The Evolution of Central Bank Governance around the World," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 21(4), pages 69-90, Fall.
    10. Dreher, Axel & Sturm, Jan-Egbert & de Haan, Jakob, 2008. "Does high inflation cause central bankers to lose their job? Evidence based on a new data set," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 24(4), pages 778-787, December.
    11. Richard T. Froyen & Alfred V. Guender, 2007. "Optimal Monetary Policy under Uncertainty," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 12510.
    12. Mark Gertler & Jordi Gali & Richard Clarida, 1999. "The Science of Monetary Policy: A New Keynesian Perspective," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 37(4), pages 1661-1707, December.
    13. Etienne Farvaque & Piotr Stanek & Stéphane Vigeant, 2014. "On the Performance of Monetary Policy Committees," Kyklos, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 67(2), pages 177-203, May.
    14. Xiang Lin, 1999. "Central-Bank Independence, Economic Behavior, and Optimal Term Lengths: Comment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 89(4), pages 1056-1062, September.
    15. Marco Arnone & Bernard J Laurens & Jean-François Segalotto & Martin Sommer, 2009. "Central Bank Autonomy: Lessons from Global Trends," IMF Staff Papers, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 56(2), pages 263-296, June.
    16. Waller, Christopher J & Walsh, Carl E, 1996. "Central-Bank Independence, Economic Behavior, and Optimal Term Lengths," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 86(5), pages 1139-1153, December.
    17. Hahn, Volker, 2014. "An argument in favor of long terms for central bankers," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 122(2), pages 132-135.
    18. Claussen, Carl Andreas & Matsen, Egil & Røisland, Øistein & Torvik, Ragnar, 2012. "Overconfidence, monetary policy committees and chairman dominance," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 81(2), pages 699-711.
    19. Toke Aidt & Zareh Asatryan & Lusine Badalyan & Friedrich Heinemann, 2020. "Vote Buying or (Political) Business (Cycles) as Usual?," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 102(3), pages 409-425, July.
    20. Dreher, Axel & Sturm, Jan-Egbert & Haan, Jakob de, 2010. "When is a central bank governor replaced? Evidence based on a new data set," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 32(3), pages 766-781, September.
    21. Jean‐Pierre Benoît & Juan Dubra, 2011. "Apparent Overconfidence," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 79(5), pages 1591-1625, September.
    22. Muhammad Azmat Hayat & Étienne Farvaque, 2011. "When are Central Bankers Removed?," Revue économique, Presses de Sciences-Po, vol. 62(3), pages 471-478.
    23. Axilrod, Stephen H., 2011. "Inside the Fed: Monetary Policy and Its Management, Martin through Greenspan to Bernanke," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 2, volume 1, number 0262015625, December.
    24. Terrance Odean, 1998. "Volume, Volatility, Price, and Profit When All Traders Are Above Average," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 53(6), pages 1887-1934, December.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

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


    Cited by:

    1. Hamza Bennani, 2018. "Media Perception of Fed Chair's Overconfidence and Market Expectations," EconomiX Working Papers 2018-29, University of Paris Nanterre, EconomiX.

    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. Donato Masciandaro & Davide Romelli, 2019. "Behavioral Monetary Policymaking: Economics, Political Economy and Psychology," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Behavioral Finance The Coming of Age, chapter 9, pages 285-329, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    2. Hamza Bennani, 2018. "Media Perception of Fed Chair's Overconfidence and Market Expectations," EconomiX Working Papers 2018-29, University of Paris Nanterre, EconomiX.
    3. Jäger, Kai, 2016. "The Role of Regime Type in the Political Economy of Foreign Reserve Accumulation," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 79-96.
    4. Berggren, Niclas & Daunfeldt, Sven-Olov & Hellström, Jörgen, 2014. "Social trust and central-bank independence," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 34(C), pages 425-439.
    5. Guillermo Vuletin & Ling Zhu, 2011. "Replacing a “Disobedient” Central Bank Governor with a “Docile” One: A Novel Measure of Central Bank Independence and Its Effect on Inflation," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 43(6), pages 1185-1215, September.
    6. Claussen, Carl Andreas & Matsen, Egil & Røisland, Øistein & Torvik, Ragnar, 2012. "Overconfidence, monetary policy committees and chairman dominance," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 81(2), pages 699-711.
    7. Gauti B. Eggertsson & Eric Le Borgne, 2005. "The politics of central bank independence: a theory of pandering and learning in government," Staff Reports 205, Federal Reserve Bank of New York.
    8. Carl Walsh, 2015. "Goals and Rules in Central Bank Design," CESifo Working Paper Series 5293, CESifo.
    9. Hahn, Volker, 2016. "Designing monetary policy committees," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 65(C), pages 47-67.
    10. Gauti B. Eggertsson & Eric Le Borgne, 2010. "A Political Agency Theory of Central Bank Independence," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 42(4), pages 647-677, June.
    11. D. Masciandaro, 2019. "What Bird Is That? Central Banking And Monetary Policy In The Last Forty Years," BAFFI CAREFIN Working Papers 19127, BAFFI CAREFIN, Centre for Applied Research on International Markets Banking Finance and Regulation, Universita' Bocconi, Milano, Italy.
    12. Hübner, Malte & Vannoorenberghe, Gonzague, 2015. "Patience and Inflation," MPRA Paper 65811, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    13. Richard C.K. Burdekin & King Banaian & Mark Hallerberg & Pierre L. Siklos, 2011. "Fiscal and monetary institutions and policies: onward and upward?," Journal of Financial Economic Policy, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 3(4), pages 340-354, November.
    14. Pietro Ortoleva & Erik Snowberg, 2015. "Overconfidence in Political Behavior," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 105(2), pages 504-535, February.
    15. Paul De Grauwe, 2014. "Animal Spirits and Monetary Policy," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Exchange Rates and Global Financial Policies, chapter 18, pages 473-520, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    16. Hahn, Volker, 2014. "An argument in favor of long terms for central bankers," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 122(2), pages 132-135.
    17. N. Gregory Mankiw & Ricardo Reis, 2002. "Sticky Information versus Sticky Prices: A Proposal to Replace the New Keynesian Phillips Curve," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 117(4), pages 1295-1328.
    18. Berger, Wolfram & Kißmer, Friedrich, 2013. "Central bank independence and financial stability: A tale of perfect harmony?," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 31(C), pages 109-118.
    19. Leković Milјan, 2020. "Cognitive Biases as an Integral Part of Behavioral Finance," Economic Themes, Sciendo, vol. 58(1), pages 75-96, March.
    20. Hamza Bennani, 2023. "Overconfidence of the chair of the Federal Reserve and market expectations: Evidence based on media coverage," International Journal of Finance & Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 28(3), pages 3403-3419, July.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Central banker; overconfidence; legal mandate; optimal term length;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • E58 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit - - - Central Banks and Their Policies
    • H11 - Public Economics - - Structure and Scope of Government - - - Structure and Scope of Government

    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:hal:journl:hal-01533519. 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: CCSD (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/ .

    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.