IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/fip/fedgfe/2024-84.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Disagreement About the Term Structure of Inflation Expectations

Author

Abstract

We develop a model of the individual term structure of inflation expectations across forecasting horizons. Using the Survey of Professional Forecasters, we decompose disagreement about inflation expectations into individuals' long-term beliefs, private information, and public information. We find that in normal times, long-horizon disagreement is predominantly driven by individuals' long-term beliefs, while short-horizon disagreement stems from private information. During economic downturns, heterogeneous reactions to public information become a key driver of disagreement at all horizons. When forecasters disagree about public information, monetary policy exhibits a delayed response and a price puzzle emerges, underscoring the importance of anchoring inflation expectations.

Suggested Citation

  • Hie Joo Ahn & Leland E. Farmer, 2024. "Disagreement About the Term Structure of Inflation Expectations," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2024-084, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    • Handle: RePEc:fip:fedgfe:2024-84
    DOI: 10.17016/FEDS.2024.084
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/feds/files/2024084pap.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.17016/FEDS.2024.084?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. S. Borağan Aruoba, 2020. "Term Structures of Inflation Expectations and Real Interest Rates," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 38(3), pages 542-553, July.
    2. Beveridge, Stephen & Nelson, Charles R., 1981. "A new approach to decomposition of economic time series into permanent and transitory components with particular attention to measurement of the `business cycle'," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 7(2), pages 151-174.
    3. Jose A. Scheinkman & Wei Xiong, 2003. "Overconfidence and Speculative Bubbles," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 111(6), pages 1183-1219, December.
    4. Glas, Alexander & Hartmann, Matthias, 2016. "Inflation uncertainty, disagreement and monetary policy: Evidence from the ECB Survey of Professional Forecasters," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 39(PB), pages 215-228.
    5. Diebold, Francis X. & Li, Canlin & Yue, Vivian Z., 2008. "Global yield curve dynamics and interactions: A dynamic Nelson-Siegel approach," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 146(2), pages 351-363, October.
    6. Salomé Fofana & Paula Patzelt & Ricardo Reis, 2024. "Household Disagreement about Expected Inflation," Discussion Papers 2418, Centre for Macroeconomics (CFM).
    7. Olivier Coibion & Yuriy Gorodnichenko, 2012. "What Can Survey Forecasts Tell Us about Information Rigidities?," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 120(1), pages 116-159.
    8. Craig Burnside & Martin Eichenbaum & Sergio Rebelo, 2016. "Understanding Booms and Busts in Housing Markets," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 124(4), pages 1088-1147.
    9. 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.
    10. Cornand, Camille & Hubert, Paul, 2022. "Information frictions across various types of inflation expectations," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 146(C).
    11. Michael Woodford, 2001. "Imperfect Common Knowledge and the Effects of Monetary Policy," NBER Working Papers 8673, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    12. Diebold, Francis X. & Li, Canlin, 2006. "Forecasting the term structure of government bond yields," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 130(2), pages 337-364, February.
    13. Bartosz Mackowiak & Mirko Wiederholt, 2009. "Optimal Sticky Prices under Rational Inattention," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(3), pages 769-803, June.
    14. Cosmin L. Ilut & Martin Schneider, 2014. "Ambiguous Business Cycles," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 104(8), pages 2368-2399, August.
    15. James H. Stock & Mark W. Watson, 2016. "Core Inflation and Trend Inflation," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 98(4), pages 770-784, October.
    16. Simon Gilchrist & Egon Zakrajsek, 2012. "Credit Spreads and Business Cycle Fluctuations," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 102(4), pages 1692-1720, June.
    17. Bartosz Maćkowiak & Filip Matějka & Mirko Wiederholt, 2023. "Rational Inattention: A Review," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 61(1), pages 226-273, March.
    18. Shigeru Fujita & Garey Ramey, 2009. "The Cyclicality Of Separation And Job Finding Rates," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 50(2), pages 415-430, May.
    19. Lahiri, Kajal & Sheng, Xuguang, 2008. "Evolution of forecast disagreement in a Bayesian learning model," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 144(2), pages 325-340, June.
    20. James H. Stock & Mark W. Watson, 2018. "Identification and Estimation of Dynamic Causal Effects in Macroeconomics Using External Instruments," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 128(610), pages 917-948, May.
    21. Ehrmann, Michael & Gaballo, Gaetano & Hoffmann, Peter & Strasser, Georg, 2019. "Can more public information raise uncertainty? The international evidence on forward guidance," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 108(C), pages 93-112.
    22. Binder, Carola C., 2017. "Measuring uncertainty based on rounding: New method and application to inflation expectations," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 90(C), pages 1-12.
    23. Alan J. Auerbach & Yuriy Gorodnichenko, 2013. "Output Spillovers from Fiscal Policy," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 103(3), pages 141-146, May.
    24. Michael D. Bauer & Eric T. Swanson, 2023. "An Alternative Explanation for the "Fed Information Effect"," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 113(3), pages 664-700, March.
    25. Marta Bańbura & Michele Modugno, 2014. "Maximum Likelihood Estimation Of Factor Models On Datasets With Arbitrary Pattern Of Missing Data," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 29(1), pages 133-160, January.
    26. Nelson, Charles R & Siegel, Andrew F, 1987. "Parsimonious Modeling of Yield Curves," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 60(4), pages 473-489, October.
    27. Patton, Andrew J. & Timmermann, Allan, 2010. "Why do forecasters disagree? Lessons from the term structure of cross-sectional dispersion," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 57(7), pages 803-820, October.
    28. Guido Lorenzoni, 2009. "A Theory of Demand Shocks," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(5), pages 2050-2084, December.
    29. Falck, E. & Hoffmann, M. & Hürtgen, P., 2021. "Disagreement about inflation expectations and monetary policy transmission," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 118(C), pages 15-31.
    30. Ricardo Reis, 2020. "The People versus the Markets: A Parsimonious Model of Inflation Expectations," Discussion Papers 2033, Centre for Macroeconomics (CFM).
    31. Francisco Barillas & Kristoffer P. Nimark, 2017. "Speculation and the Term Structure of Interest Rates," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 30(11), pages 4003-4037.
    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. McNeil, James, 2023. "Monetary policy and the term structure of inflation expectations with information frictions," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 146(C).
    2. Andrade, Philippe & Crump, Richard K. & Eusepi, Stefano & Moench, Emanuel, 2016. "Fundamental disagreement," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 83(C), pages 106-128.
    3. Gabriel Caldas Montes & Caio Ferrari Ferreira, 2019. "Does monetary policy credibility mitigate the effects of uncertainty about exchange rate on uncertainties about both inflation and interest rate?," International Economics and Economic Policy, Springer, vol. 16(4), pages 649-678, October.
    4. Edward P. Herbst & Fabian Winkler, 2021. "The Factor Structure of Disagreement," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2021-046, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    5. Richard K. Crump & Stefano Eusepi & Emanuel Moench & Bruce Preston, 2021. "The Term Structure of Expectations," Staff Reports 992, Federal Reserve Bank of New York.
    6. George‐Marios Angeletos & Fabrice Collard & Harris Dellas, 2018. "Quantifying Confidence," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 86(5), pages 1689-1726, September.
    7. Clements, Michael P., 2012. "Do professional forecasters pay attention to data releases?," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 28(2), pages 297-308.
    8. Stefano Eusepi & Richard Crump & Emanuel Moench & Philippe Andrade, 2014. "Noisy Information and Fundamental Disagreement," 2014 Meeting Papers 797, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    9. George-Marios Angeletos & Chen Lian, 2016. "Incomplete Information in Macroeconomics: Accommodating Frictions in Coordination," NBER Working Papers 22297, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    10. Carola Binder & Tucker S. Mcelroy & Xuguang S. Sheng, 2022. "The Term Structure of Uncertainty: New Evidence from Survey Expectations," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 54(1), pages 39-71, February.
    11. Ricco, Giovanni, 2015. "A new identification of fiscal shocks based on the information flow," Working Paper Series 1813, European Central Bank.
    12. Paul Hubert, 2014. "FOMC Forecasts as a Focal Point for Private Expectations," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 46(7), pages 1381-1420, October.
    13. Zhao Han & Xiaohan Ma & Ruoyun Mao, 2023. "The Role of Dispersed Information in Inflation and Inflation Expectations," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 48, pages 72-106, April.
    14. An, Zidong & Zheng, Xinye, 2023. "Diligent forecasters can make accurate predictions despite disagreeing with the consensus," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 125(C).
    15. James M. Nason & Gregor W. Smith, 2021. "Measuring the slowly evolving trend in US inflation with professional forecasts," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 36(1), pages 1-17, January.
    16. Alessandro Barbera & Dora Xia & Sonya Zhu, 2023. "The term structure of inflation forecasts disagreement and monetary policy transmission," BIS Working Papers 1114, Bank for International Settlements.
    17. Benhima, Kenza, 2019. "Booms and busts with dispersed information," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 107(C), pages 32-47.
    18. Benigno, Pierpaolo & Karantounias, Anastasios G., 2019. "Overconfidence, subjective perception and pricing behavior," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 164(C), pages 107-132.
    19. Ou, Shengliang & Zhang, Donghai & Zhang, Renbin, 2021. "Information frictions, monetary policy, and the paradox of price flexibility," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 120(C), pages 70-82.
    20. Salomé Fofana & Paula Patzelt & Ricardo Reis, 2024. "Household Disagreement about Expected Inflation," Discussion Papers 2418, Centre for Macroeconomics (CFM).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Inflation Expectations; Term Structure; Disagreement; Monetary Policy;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • E17 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - General Aggregative Models - - - Forecasting and Simulation: Models and Applications
    • E31 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Price Level; Inflation; Deflation
    • E37 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Forecasting and Simulation: Models and Applications
    • E52 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit - - - Monetary Policy
    • E58 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit - - - Central Banks and Their Policies
    • E65 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Macroeconomic Policy, Macroeconomic Aspects of Public Finance, and General Outlook - - - Studies of Particular Policy Episodes

    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:2024-84. 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.