IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/nbr/nberwo/2201.html

Imperfect Information and Staggered Price Setting

Author

Listed:
  • Laurence Ball
  • Stephen G. Cecchetti

Abstract

Many Keynesian macroeconomic models are based on the assumption that firms change prices at different times. This paper presents an explanation for this "staggered" price setting. We develop a model in which firms have imperfect knowledge of the current state of the economy and gain information by observing the prices set by others. This gives each firm an incentive to set its price shortly after as many firms as possible. Staggering can be the equilibrium outcome. In addition, the information gains can make staggering socially optimal even though it increases aggregate fluctuations.

Suggested Citation

  • Laurence Ball & Stephen G. Cecchetti, 1987. "Imperfect Information and Staggered Price Setting," NBER Working Papers 2201, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:2201
    Note: ME
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.nber.org/papers/w2201.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Laurence Ball & David Romer, 1989. "The Equilibrium and Optimal Timing of Price Changes," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 56(2), pages 179-198.
    2. Laurence Ball & David Romer, 1989. "Are Prices Too Sticky?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 104(3), pages 507-524.
    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. Cho, Guedae & Kim, MinKyoung & Koo, Won W., 2003. "Relative Agricultural Price Changes In Different Time Horizons," 2003 Annual meeting, July 27-30, Montreal, Canada 22249, American Agricultural Economics Association (New Name 2008: Agricultural and Applied Economics Association).
    2. Lau, Sau-Him Paul, 2001. "Aggregate Pattern of Time-dependent Adjustment Rules, II: Strategic Complementarity and Endogenous Nonsynchronization," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 98(2), pages 199-231, June.
    3. Jean-Olivier Hairault & Fran√Áois Langot, 2012. "Markups and the Welfare Cost of Business Cycles: A Reappraisal," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 44(5), pages 995-1014, August.
    4. Alan S. Blinder, 1988. "The Fall and Rise of Keynesian Economics," The Economic Record, The Economic Society of Australia, vol. 64(4), pages 278-294, December.
    5. Emmanuel Dhyne & Jerzy Konieczny, 2014. "Aggregation And The Staggering Of Price Changes," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 52(2), pages 732-756, April.
    6. Mash, Richard, 2002. "New Keynesian Microfoundations Revisited: A Generalised Calvo-Taylor Model and the Desirability of Inflation vs. Price Level Targeting," Royal Economic Society Annual Conference 2002 138, Royal Economic Society.
    7. Ramon Maria-Dolores, "undated". "Asymmetries in the Cyclical Effects of Monetary Policy on Output: Some European Evidence," Working Papers on International Economics and Finance 02-04, FEDEA.
    8. Fishman, Arthur & Simhon, Avi, 2005. "Can small menu costs explain sticky prices?," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 87(2), pages 227-230, May.
    9. Gilberto Tadeu Lima & Jaylson Jair Silveira, 2015. "Monetary Neutrality Under Evolutionary Dominance Of Bounded Rationality," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 53(2), pages 1108-1131, April.
    10. Kevin X. D. Huang & Jonathan L. Willis, 2018. "Sectoral Interactions and Monetary Policy under Costly Price Adjustments," Annals of Economics and Finance, Society for AEF, vol. 19(2), pages 337-374, November.
    11. No authors listed, 1994. "Was ist neu am "Neuen Keynesianismus"?," Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft - WuG, Kammer für Arbeiter und Angestellte für Wien, Abteilung Wirtschaftswissenschaft und Statistik, vol. 20(1), pages 3-13.
    12. Mankiw, N. Gregory & Miron, Jeffrey A., 1991. "Should the fed smooth interest rates? the case of seasonal monetary policy," Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 34(1), pages 41-69, January.
    13. Ball, Laurence & Mankiw, N. Gregory, 1994. "A sticky-price manifesto," Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 41(1), pages 127-151, December.
    14. Cynthia Doniger, 2019. "Do Greasy Wheels Curb Inequality?," 2019 Meeting Papers 1163, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    15. Kevin X. D. Huang & Zheng Liu, 1999. "Chain of production as a monetary propagation mechanism," Discussion Paper / Institute for Empirical Macroeconomics 130, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis.
    16. V. V Chari & Patrick J. Kehoe & Ellen R. McGrattan, 2002. "Can Sticky Price Models Generate Volatile and Persistent Real Exchange Rates?," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 69(3), pages 533-563.
    17. Claus Thustrup Kreiner, 2002. "Do the New Keynesian Microfoundations Rationalise Stabilisation Policy?," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 112(479), pages 384-401, April.
    18. Obstfeld, Maurice & Rogoff, Kenneth, 1995. "Exchange Rate Dynamics Redux," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 103(3), pages 624-660, June.
    19. Jens-Peter Loy & Christoph Weiss, 2002. "Staggering and synchronisation of prices in a low-inflation environment: Evidence from German food stores," Agribusiness, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 18(4), pages 437-457.
    20. Hoffmann, A. & Loy, J.-P., . "Sonderangebote und Preissynchronisation im deutschen Lebensmitteleinzelhandel," Proceedings “Schriften der Gesellschaft für Wirtschafts- und Sozialwissenschaften des Landbaues e.V.”, German Association of Agricultural Economists (GEWISOLA), vol. 45.

    More about this item

    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:nbr:nberwo:2201. 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: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/nberrus.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.