IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/aea/aejmac/v2y2010i2p1-30.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Labor Markets and Monetary Policy: A New Keynesian Model with Unemployment

Author

Listed:
  • Olivier Blanchard
  • Jordi Galí

Abstract

We construct a utility-based model of fluctuations with nominal rigidities and unemployment. We first show that under a standard utility specification, productivity shocks have no effect on unemployment in the constrained efficient allocation. That property is also shown to hold, despite labor market frictions, in the decentralized equilibrium under flexible prices and wages. Inefficient unemployment fluctuations arise when we introduce real-wage rigidities. As a result, in the presence of staggered price setting by firms, the central bank faces a trade-off between inflation and unemployment stabilization, which depends on labor market characteristics. We draw the implications for optimal monetary policy. (JEL E12, E24, E52)

Suggested Citation

  • Olivier Blanchard & Jordi Galí, 2010. "Labor Markets and Monetary Policy: A New Keynesian Model with Unemployment," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 2(2), pages 1-30, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:aea:aejmac:v:2:y:2010:i:2:p:1-30
    Note: DOI: 10.1257/mac.2.2.1
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.aeaweb.org/articles.php?doi=10.1257/mac.2.2.1
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: http://www.aeaweb.org/aej/mac/data/2009-0108_data.zip
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to AEA members and institutional subscribers.
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Marcus Hagedorn & Iourii Manovskii, 2008. "The Cyclical Behavior of Equilibrium Unemployment and Vacancies Revisited," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 98(4), pages 1692-1706, September.
    2. Cheron, Arnaud & Langot, Francois, 2000. "The Phillips and Beveridge curves revisited," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 69(3), pages 371-376, December.
    3. Mark Bils & Peter J. Klenow, 2004. "Some Evidence on the Importance of Sticky Prices," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 112(5), pages 947-985, October.
    4. Mark Gertler & Luca Sala & Antonella Trigari, 2008. "An Estimated Monetary DSGE Model with Unemployment and Staggered Nominal Wage Bargaining," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 40(8), pages 1713-1764, December.
    5. Christoffel, Kai & Linzert, Tobias, 2005. "The role of real wage rigidity and labor market frictions for unemployment and inflation dynamics," Working Paper Series 556, European Central Bank.
    6. Antonella Trigari, 2006. "The Role of Search Frictions and Bargaining for Inflation Dynamics," Working Papers 304, IGIER (Innocenzo Gasparini Institute for Economic Research), Bocconi University.
    7. Gali, Jordi & Gertler, Mark, 1999. "Inflation dynamics: A structural econometric analysis," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 44(2), pages 195-222, October.
    8. Christopher A. Pissarides, 2009. "The Unemployment Volatility Puzzle: Is Wage Stickiness the Answer?," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 77(5), pages 1339-1369, September.
    9. Krause, Michael U. & Lubik, Thomas A., 2007. "The (ir)relevance of real wage rigidity in the New Keynesian model with search frictions," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 54(3), pages 706-727, April.
    10. Antonella Trigari, 2009. "Equilibrium Unemployment, Job Flows, and Inflation Dynamics," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 41(1), pages 1-33, February.
    11. Robert Shimer, 2005. "The Cyclical Behavior of Equilibrium Unemployment and Vacancies," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(1), pages 25-49, March.
    12. Mark Gertler & Antonella Trigari, 2009. "Unemployment Fluctuations with Staggered Nash Wage Bargaining," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 117(1), pages 38-86, February.
    13. Moyen, Stephane & Sahuc, Jean-Guillaume, 2005. "Incorporating labour market frictions into an optimising-based monetary policy model," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 22(1), pages 159-186, January.
    14. Thomas, Carlos, 2008. "Search and matching frictions and optimal monetary policy," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(5), pages 936-956, July.
    15. Altug,Sumru & Chadha,Jagjit S. & Nolan,Charles (ed.), 2003. "Dynamic Macroeconomic Analysis," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521826686, October.
    16. Erceg, Christopher J. & Henderson, Dale W. & Levin, Andrew T., 2000. "Optimal monetary policy with staggered wage and price contracts," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 46(2), pages 281-313, October.
    17. Merz, Monika, 1995. "Search in the labor market and the real business cycle," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 36(2), pages 269-300, November.
    18. Rafael Domenech & Javier Andres & Javier Ferri, 2006. "Price Rigidity and the Volatility of Vacancies and Unemployment," Working Papers 0601, International Economics Institute, University of Valencia.
    19. Andolfatto, David, 1996. "Business Cycles and Labor-Market Search," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 86(1), pages 112-132, March.
    20. Olivier Blanchard & Jordi Galí, 2007. "Real Wage Rigidities and the New Keynesian Model," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 39(s1), pages 35-65, February.
    21. Barro, Robert J, 1988. "The Persistence of Unemployment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 78(2), pages 32-37, May.
    22. Faia, Ester, 2008. "Optimal monetary policy rules with labor market frictions," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 32(5), pages 1600-1621, May.
    23. Altug,Sumru & Chadha,Jagjit S. & Nolan,Charles (ed.), 2003. "Dynamic Macroeconomic Analysis," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521534031, October.
    24. Emi Nakamura & Jón Steinsson, 2008. "Five Facts about Prices: A Reevaluation of Menu Cost Models," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 123(4), pages 1415-1464.
    25. Calvo, Guillermo A., 1983. "Staggered prices in a utility-maximizing framework," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 12(3), pages 383-398, September.
    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. Thomas, Carlos, 2008. "Search and matching frictions and optimal monetary policy," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(5), pages 936-956, July.
    2. Galí, Jordi, 2010. "Monetary Policy and Unemployment," Handbook of Monetary Economics, in: Benjamin M. Friedman & Michael Woodford (ed.), Handbook of Monetary Economics, edition 1, volume 3, chapter 10, pages 487-546, Elsevier.
    3. Federico Di Pace & Matthias Hertweck, 2019. "Labor Market Frictions, Monetary Policy, and Durable Goods," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 32, pages 274-304, April.
    4. Sergio A. Lago Alves, 2018. "Monetary Policy, Trend Inflation, and Unemployment Volatility," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 50(4), pages 637-673, June.
    5. Gregory De Walque & Olivier Pierrard & Henri Sneessens & Raf Wouters, 2009. "Sequential Bargaining in a Neo-Keynesian Model with Frictional Unemployment and Staggered Wage Negotiations," Annals of Economics and Statistics, GENES, issue 95-96, pages 223-250.
    6. Holt Richard, 2008. "Job Reallocation, Unemployment and Hours in a New Keynesian Model," The B.E. Journal of Macroeconomics, De Gruyter, vol. 8(1), pages 1-47, August.
    7. Federico Ravenna & Carl E. Walsh, 2011. "Welfare-Based Optimal Monetary Policy with Unemployment and Sticky Prices: A Linear-Quadratic Framework," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 3(2), pages 130-162, April.
    8. Abo-Zaid, Salem, 2013. "Optimal monetary policy and downward nominal wage rigidity in frictional labor markets," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 37(1), pages 345-364.
    9. Carlos Thomas, 2011. "Search Frictions, Real Rigidities, and Inflation Dynamics," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 43(6), pages 1131-1164, September.
    10. Ravenna, Federico & Walsh, Carl E., 2008. "Vacancies, unemployment, and the Phillips curve," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 52(8), pages 1494-1521, November.
    11. Lechthaler, Wolfgang & Merkl, Christian & Snower, Dennis J., 2010. "Monetary persistence and the labor market: A new perspective," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 34(5), pages 968-983, May.
    12. Mattesini, Fabrizio & Rossi, Lorenza, 2009. "Optimal monetary policy in economies with dual labor markets," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 33(7), pages 1469-1489, July.
    13. Sveen, Tommy & Weinke, Lutz, 2008. "New Keynesian perspectives on labor market dynamics," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(5), pages 921-930, July.
    14. Raissi, Mehdi, 2015. "Flexible inflation targeting and labor market inefficiencies," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 283-300.
    15. Lin, Tsu-ting Tim, 2015. "Working capital requirement and the unemployment volatility puzzle," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 201-217.
    16. Christoffel, Kai & Costain, James & de Walque, Gregory & Kuester, Keith & Linzert, Tobias & Millard, Stephen & Pierrard, Olivier, 2009. "Inflation dynamics with labour market matching: assessing alternative specifications," Bank of England working papers 375, Bank of England.
    17. Sala, Luca & Söderström, Ulf & Trigari, Antonella, 2008. "Monetary policy under uncertainty in an estimated model with labor market frictions," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(5), pages 983-1006, July.
    18. Arseneau, David M. & Chugh, Sanjay K., 2008. "Optimal fiscal and monetary policy with costly wage bargaining," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(8), pages 1401-1414, November.
    19. Federico Ravenna & Carl E. Walsh, 2009. "The welfare consequences of monetary policy," Working Paper Series 2009-12, Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco.
    20. Auray, Stéphane & de Blas, Beatriz, 2013. "Investment, matching and persistence in a modified cash-in-advance economy," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 37(3), pages 591-610.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • E12 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - General Aggregative Models - - - Keynes; Keynesian; Post-Keynesian; Modern Monetary Theory
    • E24 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Employment; Unemployment; Wages; Intergenerational Income Distribution; Aggregate Human Capital; Aggregate Labor Productivity
    • E52 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit - - - Monetary Policy

    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:aea:aejmac:v:2:y:2010:i:2:p:1-30. 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: Michael P. Albert (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/aeaaaea.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.