IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/jimfin/v27y2008i8p1407-1419.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Asymmetric information and rational expectations: When is it right to be "wrong"?

Author

Listed:
  • Demertzis, Maria
  • Hughes Hallett, Andrew

Abstract

In this paper we examine the effects of private agents being less than fully rational in their expectations. We examine this in the context of monetary policy, where the Central Bank may have uncertain preferences either by choice or by necessity. The new feature is that we allow the public to react in two different ways. They either form rational expectations and internalize the uncertainty about the Central Bank's preferences in full; or alternatively, and if this process of internalization is costly, it forms a 'best' guess regarding those preferences. This implies a certainty equivalence strategy applied to the preference parameters. As those parameters enter the decisions non-linearly, a systematic error emerges. We examine the magnitude of the resulting error in inflation and output, following the assumption of certainty equivalence. Under all reasonable levels of uncertainty, this error turns out to be small but involves trading a deflation bias against the cost of gathering the information needed for the full information rational expectations' solution.

Suggested Citation

  • Demertzis, Maria & Hughes Hallett, Andrew, 2008. "Asymmetric information and rational expectations: When is it right to be "wrong"?," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 27(8), pages 1407-1419, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:jimfin:v:27:y:2008:i:8:p:1407-1419
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0261-5606(08)00093-4
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    ---><---

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

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Faust, Jon & Svensson, Lars E O, 2002. "The Equilibrium Degree of Transparency and Control in Monetary Policy," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 34(2), pages 520-539, May.
    2. Michael Woodford, 2010. "Robustly Optimal Monetary Policy with Near-Rational Expectations," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(1), pages 274-303, March.
    3. Hughes Hallett, A. J., 1979. "Computing revealed preferences and limits to the validity of quadratic objective functions for policy optimization," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 2(1), pages 27-32.
    4. Demertzis, Maria & Hughes Hallett, Andrew, 2007. "Central Bank transparency in theory and practice," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 29(4), pages 760-789, December.
    5. Maria Demertzis & Marco Hoeberichts, 2007. "The Costs of Increasing Transparency," Open Economies Review, Springer, vol. 18(3), pages 263-280, July.
    6. Lars Peter Hansen & Thomas J Sargent, 2014. "Robust Permanent Income and Pricing," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: UNCERTAINTY WITHIN ECONOMIC MODELS, chapter 3, pages 33-81, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    7. repec:bla:econom:v:66:y:1999:i:262:p:255-69 is not listed on IDEAS
    8. Stephen Morris & Hyun Song Shin & Hui Tong, 2006. "Social Value of Public Information: Morris and Shin (2002) Is Actually Pro-Transparency, Not Con: Reply," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 96(1), pages 453-455, March.
    9. Faust, Jon & Svensson, Lars E O, 2001. "Transparency and Credibility: Monetary Policy with Unobservable Goals," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 42(2), pages 369-397, May.
    10. Sibert, Anne, 2002. "Monetary policy with uncertain central bank preferences," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 46(6), pages 1093-1109, June.
    11. Ard Reijer & Peter Vlaar, 2006. "Forecasting Inflation: An Art as Well as a Science!," De Economist, Springer, vol. 154(1), pages 19-40, March.
    12. Lars E. O. Svensson, 2006. "Social Value of Public Information: Comment: Morris and Shin (2002) Is Actually Pro-Transparency, Not Con," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 96(1), pages 448-452, March.
    13. Sims, Christopher A., 2003. "Implications of rational inattention," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 50(3), pages 665-690, April.
    14. Muscatelli, Anton, 1998. "Optimal Inflation Contracts and Inflation Targets with Uncertain Central Bank Preferences: Accountability through Independence?," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 108(447), pages 529-542, March.
    15. Kenneth Rogoff, 1985. "The Optimal Degree of Commitment to an Intermediate Monetary Target," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 100(4), pages 1169-1189.
    16. 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.
    17. Cukierman, Alex & Meltzer, Allan H, 1986. "A Theory of Ambiguity, Credibility, and Inflation under Discretion and Asymmetric Information," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 54(5), pages 1099-1128, September.
    18. Lucas, Robert Jr., 1972. "Expectations and the neutrality of money," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 4(2), pages 103-124, April.
    19. Hughes Hallett, A. J., 1984. "On alternative methods of generating risk sensitive decision rules," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 16(1-2), pages 37-44.
    20. Dieter Gerdesmeier & Barbara Roffia, 2004. "Empirical Estimates of Reaction Functions for the Euro Area," Swiss Journal of Economics and Statistics (SJES), Swiss Society of Economics and Statistics (SSES), vol. 140(I), pages 37-66, March.
    21. Petra M. Geraats, 2002. "Central Bank Transparency," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 112(483), pages 532-565, November.
    22. Stephen Morris & Hyun Song Shin, 2002. "Social Value of Public Information," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 92(5), pages 1521-1534, December.
    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. Charemza, Wojciech & Ladley, Daniel, 2016. "Central banks’ forecasts and their bias: Evidence, effects and explanation," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 32(3), pages 804-817.
    2. Anna Loleyt & Ilya Gurov, 2011. "The process of formation of inflation expectations in an information economy," IFC Bulletins chapters, in: Bank for International Settlements (ed.), Proceedings of the IFC Conference on "Initiatives to address data gaps revealed by the financial crisis", Basel, 25-26 August 2010, volume 34, pages 104-127, Bank for International Settlements.
    3. Andrew Hughes Hallett & Jan Libich, 2007. "Fiscal-monetary Interactions: The Effect of Fiscal Restraint and Public Monitoring on Central Bank Credibility," Open Economies Review, Springer, vol. 18(5), pages 559-576, November.

    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. Hughes Hallett, Andrew & Demertzis, Maria, 2005. "Forming Rational Expectations and When it is Right to be 'Wrong'," CEPR Discussion Papers 5042, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    2. Hughes Hallett, Andrew & Demertzis, Maria, 2003. "Three Models of Imperfect Transparency in Monetary Policy," CEPR Discussion Papers 4117, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    3. Maria Demertzis & Andrew Hughes Hallett, 2015. "Three different approaches to transparency in monetary policy," Economia Politica: Journal of Analytical and Institutional Economics, Springer;Fondazione Edison, vol. 32(3), pages 277-300, December.
    4. van der Cruijsen, C.A.B. & Eijffinger, S.C.W., 2007. "The Economic Impact of Central Bank Transparency : A Survey," Discussion Paper 2007-06, Tilburg University, Center for Economic Research.
    5. van der Cruijsen, C.A.B., 2008. "The economic impact of central bank transparency," Other publications TiSEM 86c1ba91-1952-45b4-adac-8, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    6. Maria Demertzis & Andrew Hughes Hallett, 2004. "Rational Ambiguity and Monitoring the Central Bank," Vanderbilt University Department of Economics Working Papers 0404, Vanderbilt University Department of Economics.
    7. Meixing Dai & Moïse Sidiropoulos, 2017. "How multiplicative uncertainty affects the tradeoff between information disclosure and stabilisation policy?," Working Papers of BETA 2017-15, Bureau d'Economie Théorique et Appliquée, UDS, Strasbourg.
    8. Andrew Hughes Hallett & Nicola Viegi, 2003. "Imperfect transparency and the strategic use of information: an ever present temptation for central bankers?," Manchester School, University of Manchester, vol. 71(5), pages 498-520, September.
    9. Volker Hahn, 2009. "Why the Publication of Socially Harmful Information May Be Socially Desirable," CER-ETH Economics working paper series 09/122, CER-ETH - Center of Economic Research (CER-ETH) at ETH Zurich.
    10. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/f4rshpf3v1umfa09lat09b1bg is not listed on IDEAS
    11. Paul Hubert, 2010. "Monetary policy, imperfect information and the expectations channel [Politique monétaire,information imparfaite et canal des anticipations]," SciencePo Working papers Main tel-04095385, HAL.
    12. repec:spo:wpmain:info:hdl:2441/f4rshpf3v1umfa09lat09b1bg is not listed on IDEAS
    13. Andrew Hallett & Jan Libich, 2012. "Explicit inflation targets and central bank independence: friends or foes?," Economic Change and Restructuring, Springer, vol. 45(4), pages 271-297, November.
    14. Facundo Albornoz & Joan-Maria Esteban & Paolo Vanin, 2009. "Government Information Transparency," Working Papers 392, Barcelona School of Economics.
    15. repec:spo:wpecon:info:hdl:2441/f4rshpf3v1umfa09lat09b1bg is not listed on IDEAS
    16. Ngomba Bodi, Francis Ghislain & Tadadjeu Wemba, Dessy-Karl & Soulemanou, Soulemanou, 2020. "Transparence des Banques Centrales et efficacité de la politique monétaire : quelles implications pour la Banque des Etats de l’Afrique Centrale ? [Central Bank's Transparency and effectiveness of ," MPRA Paper 116436, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    17. Dai, Meixing & Sidiropoulos, Moise, 2008. "Fiscal Policy in a Monetary Union in the Presence of Uncertainty about the Central Bank Preferences," MPRA Paper 13907, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised Mar 2009.
    18. Elmar Mertens, 2016. "Managing Beliefs about Monetary Policy under Discretion," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 48(4), pages 661-698, June.
    19. Demertzis, Maria & Hughes Hallett, Andrew, 2007. "Central Bank transparency in theory and practice," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 29(4), pages 760-789, December.
    20. repec:hal:wpspec:info:hdl:2441/f4rshpf3v1umfa09lat09b1bg is not listed on IDEAS
    21. Dai, Meixing & Sidiropoulos, Moïse, 2009. "Public investment, distortionary taxes and monetary policy transparency," MPRA Paper 15858, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    22. David P. Myatt & Chris Wallace, 2008. "On the Sources and Value of Information: Public Announcements and Macroeconomic Performance," Economics Series Working Papers 411, University of Oxford, Department of Economics.
    23. Hughes Hallett, Andrew & Libich, Jan, 2006. "Central Bank Independence, Accountability and Transparency: Complements or Strategic Substitutes?," CEPR Discussion Papers 5470, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    24. Hahn, Volker, 2014. "Transparency In Monetary Policy, Signaling, And Heterogeneous Information," Macroeconomic Dynamics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 18(2), pages 369-394, March.

    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:eee:jimfin:v:27:y:2008:i:8:p:1407-1419. 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: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/inca/30443 .

    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.