IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/aea/jecper/v37y2023i1p121-44.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Monetary Policy and Inequality

Author

Listed:
  • Alisdair McKay
  • Christian K. Wolf

Abstract

We ask three questions about the connection between monetary policy and inequality. First, does monetary policy affect inequality? While different households respond to changes in monetary policy for different reasons, we argue that the overall consumption effects are relatively evenly distributed across households. Second, does household heterogeneity change our understanding of monetary policy transmission? A more careful account of microeconomic consumption behavior materially alters our understanding of transmission channels, but has rather limited effect on our general view of the aggregate effects of monetary policy. Third, does inequality affect the optimal conduct of monetary policy? Since monetary policy is a rather blunt distributional tool, we argue that even a central bank with an explicit distributional mandate would not deviate much from conventional policy prescriptions.

Suggested Citation

  • Alisdair McKay & Christian K. Wolf, 2023. "Monetary Policy and Inequality," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 37(1), pages 121-144, Winter.
    • Handle: RePEc:aea:jecper:v:37:y:2023:i:1:p:121-44
    DOI: 10.1257/jep.37.1.121
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.aeaweb.org/doi/10.1257/jep.37.1.121
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://doi.org/10.3886/E183663V1
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.aeaweb.org/doi/10.1257/jep.37.1.121.appx
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.aeaweb.org/doi/10.1257/jep.37.1.121.ds
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1257/jep.37.1.121?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. Gabriel Chodorow-Reich & Plamen T. Nenov & Alp Simsek, 2021. "Stock Market Wealth and the Real Economy: A Local Labor Market Approach," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 111(5), pages 1613-1657, May.
    2. Fatih Guvenen & Serdar Ozkan & Jae Song, 2014. "The Nature of Countercyclical Income Risk," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 122(3), pages 621-660.
    3. Mark Gertler & Peter Karadi, 2015. "Monetary Policy Surprises, Credit Costs, and Economic Activity," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 7(1), pages 44-76, January.
    4. Slacalek, Jiri & Tristani, Oreste & Violante, Giovanni L., 2020. "Household balance sheet channels of monetary policy: A back of the envelope calculation for the euro area," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 115(C).
    5. Mikkel Plagborg‐Møller & Christian K. Wolf, 2021. "Local Projections and VARs Estimate the Same Impulse Responses," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 89(2), pages 955-980, March.
    6. Fatih Guvenen & Sam Schulhofer-Wohl & Jae Song & Motohiro Yogo, 2017. "Worker Betas: Five Facts about Systematic Earnings Risk," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 107(5), pages 398-403, May.
    7. Marco Di Maggio & Amir Kermani & Benjamin J. Keys & Tomasz Piskorski & Rodney Ramcharan & Amit Seru & Vincent Yao, 2017. "Interest Rate Pass-Through: Mortgage Rates, Household Consumption, and Voluntary Deleveraging," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 107(11), pages 3550-3588, November.
    8. Adam M Guren & Alisdair McKay & Emi Nakamura & Jón Steinsson, 2021. "Housing Wealth Effects: The Long View," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 88(2), pages 669-707.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Davide Debortoli & Jordi Galí, 2024. "Heterogeneity and Aggregate Fluctuations: Insights from TANK Models," NBER Chapters, in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 2024, volume 39, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Minsu Chang & Frank Schorfheide, 2024. "On the Effects of Monetary Policy Shocks on Income and Consumption Heterogeneity," NBER Working Papers 32166, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Samuel Ligonnière & Salima Ouerk, 2024. "The unequal distribution of credit: Is there any role for monetary policy?," Working Papers of BETA 2024-19, Bureau d'Economie Théorique et Appliquée, UDS, Strasbourg.
    4. Maria Cristina Barbieri Goes & Joana David Avritzer, 2023. "Monetary Policy, Distribution and Autonomous Demand in the US," Working Papers 2307, New School for Social Research, Department of Economics.
    5. Krenz, Johanna & Tsiaras, Stylianos, 2024. "Household inequality and the transmission of QE in euro area countries," WiSo-HH Working Paper Series 83, University of Hamburg, Faculty of Business, Economics and Social Sciences, WISO Research Laboratory.
    6. Evgenidis, Anastasios & Fasianos, Apostolos, 2023. "Modelling monetary policy’s impact on labour markets under Covid-19," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 230(C).
    7. Anna Stelzer, 2023. "Monetary policy and the joint distribution of income and wealth: The heterogeneous case of the euro area," Papers 2304.14264, arXiv.org.
    8. Makram El-Shagi & Steven Yamarik, 2024. "The Effect of Monetary Policy Shocks on Income Inequality across US states," CFDS Discussion Paper Series 2024/4, Center for Financial Development and Stability at Henan University, Kaifeng, Henan, China.
    9. Valeria Zvereva & Olga Demidova & Dmitry Korshunov & Alexander Myasnikov, 2024. "Impact of Intraregional Income Inequality on the Operation of the Bank of Russia's Monetary Policy Transmission Mechanism," Russian Journal of Money and Finance, Bank of Russia, vol. 83(1), pages 3-31, March.
    10. Tomás Opazo, 2023. "The Heterogeneous Effect of Monetary Policy Shocks: Evidence for US Households," Working Papers Central Bank of Chile 992, Central Bank of Chile.
    11. Bence Bardóczy & Mateo Velásquez-Giraldo, 2024. "HANK Comes of Age," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2024-052, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    12. Renzhi, Nuobu, 2023. "Household net saving positions and unconventional monetary policy transmission: Evidence from Japan," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).

    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. Garriga, Carlos & Kydland, Finn E. & Šustek, Roman, 2021. "MoNK: Mortgages in a New-Keynesian model," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 123(C).
    2. Martin Eichenbaum & Sergio Rebelo & Arlene Wong, 2022. "State-Dependent Effects of Monetary Policy: The Refinancing Channel," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 112(3), pages 721-761, March.
    3. Funke, Michael & Li, Xiang & Zhong, Doudou, 2023. "Household indebtedness, financial frictions and the transmission of monetary policy to consumption: Evidence from China," Emerging Markets Review, Elsevier, vol. 55(C).
    4. Koeniger, Winfried & Lennartz, Benedikt & Ramelet, Marc-Antoine, 2022. "On the transmission of monetary policy to the housing market," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 145(C).
    5. Nicolas Caramp & Dejanir H. Silva, 2021. "Monetary Policy and Wealth Effects: The Role of Risk and Heterogeneity," Working Papers 341, University of California, Davis, Department of Economics.
    6. Slacalek, Jiri & Tristani, Oreste & Violante, Giovanni L., 2020. "Household balance sheet channels of monetary policy: A back of the envelope calculation for the euro area," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 115(C).
    7. Chen Lian & Yueran Ma & Carmen Wang, 2019. "Low Interest Rates and Risk-Taking: Evidence from Individual Investment Decisions," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 32(6), pages 2107-2148.
    8. Adrien Auclert, 2019. "Monetary Policy and the Redistribution Channel," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 109(6), pages 2333-2367, June.
    9. van der Zwan, Terri & Kole, Erik & van der Wel, Michel, 2024. "Heterogeneous macro and financial effects of ECB asset purchase programs," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 143(C).
    10. Marco Lo Duca & Diego Moccero & Fabio Parlapiano, 2024. "The impact of macroeconomic and monetary policy shocks on the default risk of the euro-area corporate sector," Temi di discussione (Economic working papers) 1460, Bank of Italy, Economic Research and International Relations Area.
    11. David Berger & Konstantin Milbradt & Fabrice Tourre & Joseph Vavra, 2021. "Mortgage Prepayment and Path-Dependent Effects of Monetary Policy," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 111(9), pages 2829-2878, September.
    12. Uroš Herman & Matija Lozej, 2023. "Who Gets Jobs Matters: Monetary Policy and the Labour Market in HANK and SAM," AMSE Working Papers 2334, Aix-Marseille School of Economics, France.
    13. Ostapenko, Nataliia, 2020. "Central Bank Communication: Information and Policy shocks," MPRA Paper 101278, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 21 Jun 2020.
    14. Asger Lau Andersen & Niels Johannesen & Mia Jørgensen & José-Luis Peydró, 2020. "Monetary policy and inequality," Economics Working Papers 1761, Department of Economics and Business, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, revised Mar 2021.
    15. Refet Gürkaynak & Hati̇ce Gökçe Karasoy‐Can & Sang Seok Lee, 2022. "Stock Market's Assessment of Monetary Policy Transmission: The Cash Flow Effect," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 77(4), pages 2375-2421, August.
    16. Alexander Mechanick & Jacob P. Weber, 2024. "The Countercyclical Benefits of Regulatory Costs," Staff Reports 1109, Federal Reserve Bank of New York.
    17. Isabel Gödl-Hanisch, 2023. "Bank Concentration and Monetary Policy Pass-Through," CESifo Working Paper Series 10378, CESifo.
    18. Niklas Amberg & Thomas Jansson & Mathias Klein & Anna Rogantini Picco, 2022. "Five Facts about the Distributional Income Effects of Monetary Policy Shocks," American Economic Review: Insights, American Economic Association, vol. 4(3), pages 289-304, September.
    19. Alisdair McKay & Christian K. Wolf, 2023. "What Can Time‐Series Regressions Tell Us About Policy Counterfactuals?," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 91(5), pages 1695-1725, September.
    20. Breitenlechner, Max & Geiger, Martin & Scharler, Johann, 2022. "Bank liquidity and the propagation of uncertainty in the U.S," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 46(PB).

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • D31 - Microeconomics - - Distribution - - - Personal Income and Wealth Distribution
    • E21 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Consumption; Saving; Wealth
    • E24 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Employment; Unemployment; Wages; Intergenerational Income Distribution; Aggregate Human Capital; Aggregate Labor Productivity
    • E31 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Price Level; Inflation; Deflation
    • E43 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Money and Interest Rates - - - Interest Rates: Determination, Term Structure, and Effects
    • E52 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit - - - Monetary Policy
    • G51 - Financial Economics - - Household Finance - - - Household Savings, Borrowing, Debt, and Wealth

    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:jecper:v:37:y:2023:i:1:p:121-44. 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.