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Credibility and Commitment of Monetary Policy in Open Economies

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Abstract

In this paper we study the delegation of monetary policy to independent central bankers in a two country world with monetary spill-overs. The paper shows that under imperfect commitment and private information of the Central Bankers about their objectives the optimal degree of commitment depends on the correlation structure of the shock hitting the economies. When the correlation of the shocks across countries is negative, as when the variance to output depends mainly on shocks to the terms of trade, there exist strategic complementarity in the optimal degree of commitment. When the correlation of shocks is positive (common technological or demand shocks) there exist strategic substitutability. These result may provide rationale for the simultaneous increasing attention to the institutional solution to the credibility problem in monetary policy in most advanced countries in the last decades.

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  • Marcello D'Amato & Riccardo Martina, 2000. "Credibility and Commitment of Monetary Policy in Open Economies," CSEF Working Papers 47, Centre for Studies in Economics and Finance (CSEF), University of Naples, Italy.
    • Handle: RePEc:sef:csefwp:47
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    Cited by:

    1. B. Pistoresi & F. Salsano & D. Ferrari, 2011. "Political institutions and central bank independence revisited," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 18(7), pages 679-682.
    2. Berger, Helge & Nitsch, Volker & Lybek, Tonny, 2008. "Central bank boards around the world: Why does membership size differ?," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 24(4), pages 817-832, December.
    3. Marcello D'Amato & Barbara Pistoresi & Francesco Salsano, 2009. "On the determinants of Central Bank independence in open economies," International Journal of Finance & Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 14(2), pages 107-119.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    monetary policy delegation; central bankers; private information; strategic interaction;
    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
    • D82 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Asymmetric and Private Information; Mechanism Design
    • F42 - International Economics - - Macroeconomic Aspects of International Trade and Finance - - - International Policy Coordination and Transmission

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