IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bpj/bejmac/v9y2009i1n27.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Can Financial Frictions Help Explain the Performance of the U.S. Fed?

Author

Listed:
  • de Blas Beatriz

    (Universidad Autónoma de Madrid)

Abstract

This paper analyzes the decreased volatility of U.S. macroeconomic variables starting in the 1980's in a model where monetary policy is affected by financial frictions. The model is estimated for postwar U.S. data with a break in 1981:3, allowing for changes in the policy rule, shock processes and financial frictions across subsamples. There is some evidence that changed monetary policy is more important to explain inflation stabilization, while "good luck" helps explain the increased stability in output. However, the results are most consistent with a decline in shock variances which was reinforced by a decrease in financial frictions, making the economy less vulnerable to shocks.

Suggested Citation

  • de Blas Beatriz, 2009. "Can Financial Frictions Help Explain the Performance of the U.S. Fed?," The B.E. Journal of Macroeconomics, De Gruyter, vol. 9(1), pages 1-30, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:bpj:bejmac:v:9:y:2009:i:1:n:27
    DOI: 10.2202/1935-1690.1531
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.2202/1935-1690.1531
    Download Restriction: For access to full text, subscription to the journal or payment for the individual article is required.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.2202/1935-1690.1531?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
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Zvi Hercowitz & Jeffrey C. Campbell, 2005. "The Role of Collateralized Household Debt in Macroeconomic Stabilization," 2005 Meeting Papers 120, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    2. Gali, Jordi & Lopez-Salido, J. David & Valles, Javier, 2003. "Technology shocks and monetary policy: assessing the Fed's performance," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 50(4), pages 723-743, May.
    3. Julio J. Rotemberg & Michael Woodford, 1998. "An Optimization-Based Econometric Framework for the Evaluation of Monetary Policy: Expanded Version," NBER Technical Working Papers 0233, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. de Blas, Beatriz, 2009. "Performance of interest rate rules under credit market imperfections," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 26(3), pages 586-596, May.
    5. Brian M. Doyle & Jon Faust, 2005. "Breaks in the Variability and Comovement of G-7 Economic Growth," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 87(4), pages 721-740, November.
    6. Urban J. Jermann & Vincenzo Quadrini, 2006. "Financial innovations and macroeconomic volatility," Proceedings, Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, issue Nov.
    7. Julio J. Rotemberg & Michael Woodford, 1999. "Interest Rate Rules in an Estimated Sticky Price Model," NBER Chapters, in: Monetary Policy Rules, pages 57-126, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    8. Richard Clarida & Jordi Galí & Mark Gertler, 2000. "Monetary Policy Rules and Macroeconomic Stability: Evidence and Some Theory," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 115(1), pages 147-180.
    9. Alejandro Justiniano & Giorgio E. Primiceri, 2008. "The Time-Varying Volatility of Macroeconomic Fluctuations," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 98(3), pages 604-641, June.
    10. Ireland, Peter N., 2001. "Sticky-price models of the business cycle: Specification and stability," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 47(1), pages 3-18, February.
    11. Fisher, Jonas D M, 1999. "Credit Market Imperfections and the Heterogeneous Response of Firms to Monetary Shocks," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 31(2), pages 187-211, May.
    12. Kashyap, Anil K & Stein, Jeremy C & Wilcox, David W, 1993. "Monetary Policy and Credit Conditions: Evidence from the Composition of External Finance," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 83(1), pages 78-98, March.
    13. Fabrice Collard & Patrick Feve & François Langot, 2002. "Structural Inference and the Lucas Critique," Annals of Economics and Statistics, GENES, issue 67-68, pages 183-206.
    14. Boyan Jovanovic, 2006. "Asymmetric Cycles," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 73(1), pages 145-162.
    15. Sims, Christopher A, 1980. "Comparison of Interwar and Postwar Business Cycles: Monetarism Reconsidered," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 70(2), pages 250-257, May.
    16. Mark Gertler & Simon Gilchrist, 1993. "The role of credit market imperfections in the monetary transmission mechanism: arguments and evidence," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 93-5, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    17. Thomas A. Lubik & Frank Schorfheide, 2004. "Testing for Indeterminacy: An Application to U.S. Monetary Policy," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 94(1), pages 190-217, March.
    18. Fuerst, Timothy S, 1995. "Monetary and Financial Interactions in the Business Cycle," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 27(4), pages 1321-1338, November.
    19. Clarida, Richard & Gali, Jordi & Gertler, Mark, 1998. "Monetary policy rules in practice Some international evidence," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 42(6), pages 1033-1067, June.
    20. Lawrence J. Christiano & Roberto Motto & Massimo Rostagno, 2003. "The Great Depression and the Friedman-Schwartz hypothesis," Proceedings, Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, pages 1119-1215.
    21. James H. Stock & Mark W. Watson, 2003. "Has the Business Cycle Changed and Why?," NBER Chapters, in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 2002, Volume 17, pages 159-230, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    22. Christiano, Lawrence J. & Eichenbaum, Martin & Evans, Charles L., 1997. "Sticky price and limited participation models of money: A comparison," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 41(6), pages 1201-1249, June.
    23. Shaghil Ahmed & Andrew Levin & Beth Anne Wilson, 2004. "Recent U.S. Macroeconomic Stability: Good Policies, Good Practices, or Good Luck?," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 86(3), pages 824-832, August.
    24. Sylvain Leduc & Keith Sill, 2007. "Monetary Policy, Oil Shocks, and TFP: Accounting for the Decline in U.S. Volatility," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 10(4), pages 595-614, October.
    25. Gertler, Mark, 1995. "Monetary and Financial Interactions in the Business Cycle: Comment," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 27(4), pages 1342-1353, November.
    26. Stephen G. Cecchetti & Stefan Krause, 2001. "Financial Structure, Macroeconomic Stability and Monetary Policy," NBER Working Papers 8354, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    27. John B. Taylor, 1999. "Monetary Policy Rules," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number tayl99-1.
    28. Andrews, Donald W K, 1993. "Tests for Parameter Instability and Structural Change with Unknown Change Point," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 61(4), pages 821-856, July.
    29. Carlstrom, Charles T & Fuerst, Timothy S, 1997. "Agency Costs, Net Worth, and Business Fluctuations: A Computable General Equilibrium Analysis," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 87(5), pages 893-910, December.
    30. Ellen R. McGrattan & Edward C. Prescott, 2005. "Taxes, Regulations, and the Value of U.S. and U.K. Corporations," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 72(3), pages 767-796.
    31. Vincenzo Quadrini & Fabrizio Perri, 2008. "Understanding the international great moderation," 2008 Meeting Papers 1057, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    32. Gabriel Perez-Quiros & Margaret M. McConnell, 2000. "Output Fluctuations in the United States: What Has Changed since the Early 1980's?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 90(5), pages 1464-1476, December.
    33. repec:bla:scandj:v:95:y:1993:i:1:p:43-64 is not listed on IDEAS
    34. Lucas, Robert Jr., 1990. "Liquidity and interest rates," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 50(2), pages 237-264, April.
    35. Ingo Fender, 2000. "The impact of corporate risk management on monetary policy transmission: some empirical evidence," BIS Working Papers 95, Bank for International Settlements.
    36. Townsend, Robert M., 1979. "Optimal contracts and competitive markets with costly state verification," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 21(2), pages 265-293, October.
    37. Taylor, John B., 1993. "Discretion versus policy rules in practice," Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(1), pages 195-214, December.
    38. Donald W. K. Andrews & Ray C. Fair, 1988. "Inference in Nonlinear Econometric Models with Structural Change," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 55(4), pages 615-640.
    39. Lawrence J. Christiano, 1991. "Modeling the liquidity effect of a money shock," Quarterly Review, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, vol. 15(Win), pages 3-34.
    40. Douglas Gale & Martin Hellwig, 1985. "Incentive-Compatible Debt Contracts: The One-Period Problem," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 52(4), pages 647-663.
    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. Douglas Sutherland & Peter Hoeller & Balázs Égert & Oliver Röhn, 2010. "Counter-cyclical Economic Policy," OECD Economics Department Working Papers 760, OECD Publishing.
    2. Andrea Silvestrini & Andrea Zaghini, 2015. "Financial shocks and the real economy in a nonlinear world: a survey of the theoretical and empirical literature," Questioni di Economia e Finanza (Occasional Papers) 255, Bank of Italy, Economic Research and International Relations Area.
    3. Wouter J. Den Haan & Vincent Sterk, 2011. "The Myth of Financial Innovation and the Great Moderation," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 121(553), pages 707-739, June.
    4. Begona Dominguez & Pedro Gomis-Porqueras, 2019. "The effects of secondary markets for government bonds on inflation dynamics," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 32, pages 249-273, April.
    5. Balázs Égert & Douglas Sutherland, 2014. "The Nature of Financial and Real Business Cycles: The Great Moderation and Banking Sector Pro-Cyclicality," Scottish Journal of Political Economy, Scottish Economic Society, vol. 61(1), pages 98-117, February.
    6. Zaghini, Andrea & Bencivelli, Lorenzo, 2012. "Financial innovation, macroeconomic volatility and the great moderation," MPRA Paper 41263, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    7. Dominguez, Begona & Gomis-Porqueras, Pedro, 2016. "The Effects of Secondary Markets and Unsecured Credit on Inflation Dynamics," MPRA Paper 75096, University Library of Munich, Germany.

    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. de Blas, Beatriz, 2009. "Performance of interest rate rules under credit market imperfections," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 26(3), pages 586-596, May.
    2. Christiano, Lawrence & Motto, Roberto & Rostagno, Massimo, 2010. "Financial factors in economic fluctuations," Working Paper Series 1192, European Central Bank.
    3. Cristina Fuentes‐Albero, 2019. "Financial Frictions, Financial Shocks, and Aggregate Volatility," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 51(6), pages 1581-1621, September.
    4. Thomas A. Lubik & Paolo Surico, 2010. "The Lucas critique and the stability of empirical models," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 25(1), pages 177-194, January.
    5. Jean Boivin & Marc P. Giannoni, 2006. "Has Monetary Policy Become More Effective?," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 88(3), pages 445-462, August.
    6. Florin O. Bilbiie & Roland Straub, 2013. "Asset Market Participation, Monetary Policy Rules, and the Great Inflation," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 95(2), pages 377-392, May.
    7. Linde, Jesper, 2005. "Estimating New-Keynesian Phillips curves: A full information maximum likelihood approach," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 52(6), pages 1135-1149, September.
    8. M. Marzo, 2001. "Evaluating Monetary Policy Regimes: the Role of Nominal Rigidities," Working Papers 411, Dipartimento Scienze Economiche, Universita' di Bologna.
    9. Zhixiong Zeng, 2013. "A theory of the non-neutrality of money with banking frictions and bank recapitalization," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 52(2), pages 729-754, March.
    10. Buraschi, Andrea & Jiltsov, Alexei, 2005. "Inflation risk premia and the expectations hypothesis," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 75(2), pages 429-490, February.
    11. Aadland, David, 2005. "Detrending time-aggregated data," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 89(3), pages 287-293, December.
    12. Fachat, Christian, 2000. "Agency Costs, Net Worth, and the Credit Channel of Monetary Transmission," Bonn Econ Discussion Papers 3/2000, University of Bonn, Bonn Graduate School of Economics (BGSE).
    13. Galí, Jordi, 2002. "New Perspectives on Monetary Policy, Inflation and the Business Cycle," CEPR Discussion Papers 3210, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    14. Canova, Fabio & Ferroni, Filippo, 2012. "The dynamics of US inflation: Can monetary policy explain the changes?," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 167(1), pages 47-60.
    15. Fachat, Christian, 2000. "Agency Costs, Net Worth, and the Transmission Mechanism of Monetary Policy," Bonn Econ Discussion Papers 2/2000, University of Bonn, Bonn Graduate School of Economics (BGSE).
    16. Karamé, Frédéric & Patureau, Lise & Sopraseuth, Thepthida, 2008. "Limited participation and exchange rate dynamics: Does theory meet the data?," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 32(4), pages 1041-1087, April.
    17. Christopher L. House, 2002. "Adverse Selection and the Accelerator," Macroeconomics 0211015, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    18. Antonio Moreno, 2003. "Reaching Inflation Stability," Faculty Working Papers 13/03, School of Economics and Business Administration, University of Navarra.
    19. Bilbiie, Florin O., 2004. "The great inflation, limited asset markets participation and aggregate demand: FED policy was better than you think," Working Paper Series 408, European Central Bank.
    20. Boivin, Jean, 2006. "Has U.S. Monetary Policy Changed? Evidence from Drifting Coefficients and Real-Time Data," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 38(5), pages 1149-1173, August.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    great moderation; financial frictions; monetary policy rules; limited participation;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • E13 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - General Aggregative Models - - - Neoclassical
    • E42 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Money and Interest Rates - - - Monetary Sytsems; Standards; Regimes; Government and the Monetary System
    • E44 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Money and Interest Rates - - - Financial Markets and the Macroeconomy
    • 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

    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:bpj:bejmac:v:9:y:2009:i:1:n:27. 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: Peter Golla (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.degruyter.com .

    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.