IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/nbr/nberwo/1319.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Optimal Price Adjustment with Time-Dependent Costs

Author

Listed:
  • Joshua Aizenman

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to analyze an optimal pricing rule for the case in which the costs of price adjustment are time dependent, and where those costs depend positively on the magnitude of the percentage price change. By means of discrete time model, it is shown that the optimal response to the problem under consideration is to pre-set prices for each period at the end of the previous period. Within the period prices will adjust if the unexpected shock exceeds a threshold level. In such a case the new price is established at a level that is a weighted average of the pre-set level and of the equilibrium level that would have obtained in the absence of costs of contemporaneous price adjustment. Under certain conditions, which are derived in the paper, higher volatility of unexpected inflation might reduce relative price volatility.

Suggested Citation

  • Joshua Aizenman, 1984. "Optimal Price Adjustment with Time-Dependent Costs," NBER Working Papers 1319, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:1319
    Note: EFG
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.nber.org/papers/w1319.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Mussa, Michael, 1981. "Sticky Prices and Disequilibrium Adjustment in a Rational Model of the Inflationary Process," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 71(5), pages 1020-1027, December.
    2. McCallum, Bennett T, 1977. "Price-Level Stickiness and the Feasibility of Monetary Stabilization Policy with Rational Expectations," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 85(3), pages 627-634, June.
    3. Rotemberg, Julio J, 1982. "Sticky Prices in the United States," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 90(6), pages 1187-1211, December.
    4. Eytan Sheshinski & Yoram Weiss, 1983. "Optimum Pricing Policy under Stochastic Inflation," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 50(3), pages 513-529.
    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. Michael T. Kiley, 1998. "Monetary policy under neoclassical and New-Keynesian Phillips Curves, with an application to price level and inflation targeting," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 1998-27, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    2. Loupias, C. & Ricart, R., 2004. "Price Setting in France: new Evidence from Survey Data," Working papers 120, Banque de France.
    3. Myers, Robert J. & Oehmke, James F., 1987. "Instability and Risk as Rationales for Government Intervention in Agriculture," Staff Paper Series 200938, Michigan State University, Department of Agricultural, Food, and Resource Economics.
    4. repec:ebl:ecbull:v:5:y:2002:i:5:p:1-7 is not listed on IDEAS
    5. Michael Kiley, 2002. "The lead of output over inflation in sticky price models," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 5(5), pages 1-7.
    6. Choudhary, M. Ali & Faheem, Abdul & Hanif, M. Nadim & Naeem, Saima & Pasha, Farooq, 2016. "Price setting & price stickiness: A developing economy perspective," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 44-61.
    7. Letterie, Wilko & Nilsen, Øivind A., 2016. "Price Changes - Stickiness and Internal Coordination in Multiproduct Firms," Discussion Paper Series in Economics 21/2016, Norwegian School of Economics, Department of Economics.
    8. Ginsburgh, Victor & Michel, Philippe & Moes, Philippe, 1991. "Quantity adjustment costs and price stickiness," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 36(2), pages 121-125, June.
    9. PLASMANS, Joseph & FORNERO, Jorge & MICHALAK, Tomasz, 2006. "A microfounded sectoral model for open economies," Working Papers 2007013, University of Antwerp, Faculty of Business and Economics.
    10. Chadha, Bankim & Tsiddon, Daniel, 1998. "Inflation, nominal interest rates and the variability of output," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 42(3), pages 547-573, October.
    11. S. Bertarelli, 1999. "Nominal Rigidities in a Mail Order Company: Estimation of the Probability of Price Adjustment," Working Papers 349, Dipartimento Scienze Economiche, Universita' di Bologna.
    12. McCallum, Bennett T., 2008. "Reconsideration of the P-bar model of gradual price adjustment," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 52(8), pages 1480-1493, November.
    13. McCallum, Bennett T., 2007. "Basic Calvo and P-Bar Models of Price Adjustment: A Comparison," Kiel Working Papers 1361, Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel).
    14. Erwan Gautier, 2009. "Les ajustements microéconomiques des prix : une synthèse des modèles théoriques et résultats empiriques," Revue d'économie politique, Dalloz, vol. 119(3), pages 323-372.
    15. Atish Ghosh & Holger Wolf, 2001. "Imperfect Exchange Rate Passthrough: Strategic Pricing and Menu Costs," CESifo Working Paper Series 436, CESifo.
    16. Fernando Merino, 2000. "Price-Adjustment Costs and Adjustment Frequency: An Analysis with Individual Data," Econometric Society World Congress 2000 Contributed Papers 1712, Econometric Society.
    17. Meurers Martin, 2004. "Estimating Supply and Demand Functions in International Trade: A Multivariate Cointegration Analysis for Germany / Die Schätzung von Angebots- und Nachfragefunktionen im Außenhandel: Eine multivariate," Journal of Economics and Statistics (Jahrbuecher fuer Nationaloekonomie und Statistik), De Gruyter, vol. 224(5), pages 530-556, October.
    18. Jayant Menon, 1994. "Flexible Exchange Rates and Traded Goods Prices: A Theory of the Short-Run," Centre of Policy Studies/IMPACT Centre Working Papers g-108, Victoria University, Centre of Policy Studies/IMPACT Centre.
    19. Fernando Alvarez & Francesco Lippi & Juan Passadore, 2017. "Are State- and Time-Dependent Models Really Different?," NBER Macroeconomics Annual, University of Chicago Press, vol. 31(1), pages 379-457.
    20. Ireland, Peter N., 2003. "Endogenous money or sticky prices?," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 50(8), pages 1623-1648, November.
    21. Idriss Fontaine, 2021. "Uncertainty and Labour Force Participation," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 83(2), pages 437-471, April.

    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:1319. 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.