IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/cfm/wpaper/1801.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Time-Consistently Undominated Policies

Author

Listed:
  • Charles Brendon

    (Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR)
    Centre for Macroeconomics (CFM)
    Faculty of Economics University of Cambridge)

  • Martin Ellison

    (Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR)
    Centre for Macroeconomics (CFM)
    Department of Economics Oxford University)

Abstract

This paper proposes and characterises a new normative solution concept for Kydland and Prescott problems, allowing for a commitment device. A policy choice is dominated if either (a) an alternative exists that is superior to it in a time-consistent subdomain of the constraint set, or (b) an alternative exists that Pareto-dominates it over time. Policies may be time-consistently undominated where time-consistent optimality is not possible. We derive necessary and sufficient conditions for this to be true, and show that these are equivalent to a straightforward but significant change to the first-order conditions that apply under Ramsey policy. Time-consistently undominated policies are an order of magnitude simpler than Ramsey choice, whilst retaining normative appeal. This is illustrated across a range of examples.

Suggested Citation

  • Charles Brendon & Martin Ellison, 2018. "Time-Consistently Undominated Policies," Discussion Papers 1801, Centre for Macroeconomics (CFM).
    • Handle: RePEc:cfm:wpaper:1801
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.centreformacroeconomics.ac.uk/Discussion-Papers/2018/CFMDP2018-01-Paper.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Cúrdia, Vasco & Woodford, Michael, 2016. "Credit Frictions and Optimal Monetary Policy," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 84(C), pages 30-65.
    2. Sleet, Christopher & Yeltekin, Sevin, 2008. "Politically credible social insurance," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(1), pages 129-151, January.
    3. Kevin W. S. Roberts, 1980. "Interpersonal Comparability and Social Choice Theory," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 47(2), pages 421-439.
    4. Javier Diaz-Gimenez & Giorgia Giovannetti & Ramon Marimon & Pedro Teles, 2008. "Nominal Debt as a Burden on Monetary Policy," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 11(3), pages 493-514, July.
    5. Fernando Martin, 2009. "A Positive Theory of Government Debt," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 12(4), pages 608-631, October.
    6. Mikhail Golosov & Luigi Iovino, 2021. "Social Insurance, Information Revelation, and Lack of Commitment," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 129(9), pages 2629-2665.
    7. Chari, V.V. & Kehoe, Patrick J., 1999. "Optimal fiscal and monetary policy," Handbook of Macroeconomics, in: J. B. Taylor & M. Woodford (ed.), Handbook of Macroeconomics, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 26, pages 1671-1745, Elsevier.
    8. Damjanovic, Tatiana & Damjanovic, Vladislav & Nolan, Charles, 2008. "Unconditionally optimal monetary policy," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(3), pages 491-500, April.
    9. Emmanuel Farhi & Iván Werning, 2007. "Inequality and Social Discounting," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 115(3), pages 365-402.
    10. Catarina Reis, 2013. "Taxation without commitment," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 52(2), pages 565-588, March.
    11. Adam, Klaus & Woodford, Michael, 2012. "Robustly optimal monetary policy in a microfounded New Keynesian model," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 59(5), pages 468-487.
    12. Lars E. O. Svensson, 1999. "How should monetary policy be conducted in an era of price stability?," Proceedings - Economic Policy Symposium - Jackson Hole, Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, pages 195-259.
    13. Ellison, Martin & Rankin, Neil, 2007. "Optimal monetary policy when lump-sum taxes are unavailable: A reconsideration of the outcomes under commitment and discretion," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 31(1), pages 219-243, January.
    14. Lucas, Robert Jr. & Stokey, Nancy L., 1983. "Optimal fiscal and monetary policy in an economy without capital," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 12(1), pages 55-93.
    15. Andrew P. Blake & Tatiana Kirsanova, 2012. "Discretionary Policy and Multiple Equilibria in LQ RE Models," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 79(4), pages 1309-1339.
    16. Albert Marcet & Ramon Marimon, 2019. "Recursive Contracts," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 87(5), pages 1589-1631, September.
    17. Javier Bianchi & Enrique G. Mendoza, 2018. "Optimal Time-Consistent Macroprudential Policy," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 126(2), pages 588-634.
    18. Niemann, Stefan & Pichler, Paul & Sorger, Gerhard, 2013. "Public debt, discretionary policy, and inflation persistence," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 37(6), pages 1097-1109.
    19. Davide Debortoli & Ricardo Nunes & Pierre Yared, 2017. "Optimal Time-Consistent Government Debt Maturity," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 132(1), pages 55-102.
    20. Salvador Ortigueira, 2006. "Markov-Perfect Optimal Taxation," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 9(1), pages 153-178, January.
    21. Corsetti, Giancarlo & Dedola, Luca & Leduc, Sylvain, 2010. "Optimal Monetary Policy in Open Economies," Handbook of Monetary Economics, in: Benjamin M. Friedman & Michael Woodford (ed.), Handbook of Monetary Economics, edition 1, volume 3, chapter 16, pages 861-933, Elsevier.
    22. Giannoni, Marc P. & Woodford, Michael, 2017. "Optimal target criteria for stabilization policy," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 168(C), pages 55-106.
    23. Emmanuel Farhi & Christopher Sleet & Iván Werning & Sevin Yeltekin, 2012. "Non-linear Capital Taxation Without Commitment," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 79(4), pages 1469-1493.
    24. Benigno, Pierpaolo & Paciello, Luigi, 2014. "Monetary policy, doubts and asset prices," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 64(C), pages 85-98.
    25. Christopher Sleet & Sevin Yeltekin, 2006. "Credibility and endogenous societal discounting," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 9(3), pages 410-437, July.
    26. Atkeson, Andrew, 1991. "International Lending with Moral Hazard and Risk of Repudiation," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 59(4), pages 1069-1089, July.
    27. Nash, John, 1950. "The Bargaining Problem," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 18(2), pages 155-162, April.
    28. Benigno, Pierpaolo & Woodford, Michael, 2012. "Linear-quadratic approximation of optimal policy problems," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 147(1), pages 1-42.
    29. Andrew Blake, 2001. "A Timeless Perspective on Optimality in Forward-Looking Rational Expectations Models," National Institute of Economic and Social Research (NIESR) Discussion Papers 188, National Institute of Economic and Social Research.
    30. Thomas, Jonathan & Worrall, Tim, 1990. "Income fluctuation and asymmetric information: An example of a repeated principal-agent problem," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 51(2), pages 367-390, August.
    31. Judd, Kenneth L., 1985. "Redistributive taxation in a simple perfect foresight model," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 28(1), pages 59-83, October.
    32. Roc Armenter, 2013. "The perils of nominal targets," Working Papers 14-2, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia.
    33. Paul Klein & JosÈ-VÌctor RÌos-Rull, 2003. "Time-consistent optimal fiscal policy," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 44(4), pages 1217-1245, November.
    34. Chamley, Christophe, 1986. "Optimal Taxation of Capital Income in General Equilibrium with Infinite Lives," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 54(3), pages 607-622, May.
    35. Ludwig Straub & Iván Werning, 2020. "Positive Long-Run Capital Taxation: Chamley-Judd Revisited," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 110(1), pages 86-119, January.
    36. Daron Acemoglu & Mikhail Golosov & Aleh Tsyvinski, 2010. "Dynamic Mirrlees Taxation under Political Economy Constraints," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 77(3), pages 841-881.
    37. Christopher Phelan, 2006. "Opportunity and Social Mobility," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 73(2), pages 487-504.
    38. Narayana R. Kocherlakota, 1996. "Implications of Efficient Risk Sharing without Commitment," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 63(4), pages 595-609.
    39. Christopher Phelan & Ennio Stacchetti, 2001. "Sequential Equilibria in a Ramsey Tax Model," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 69(6), pages 1491-1518, November.
    40. Debortoli, Davide & Nunes, Ricardo, 2010. "Fiscal policy under loose commitment," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 145(3), pages 1005-1032, May.
    41. Blake, Andrew P. & Kapetanios, George, 2000. "A radial basis function artificial neural network test for ARCH," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 69(1), pages 15-23, October.
    42. Charles Engel, 2014. "Exchange Rate Stabilization and Welfare," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 6(1), pages 155-177, August.
    43. Paul Klein & Per Krusell & José-Víctor Ríos-Rull, 2008. "Time-Consistent Public Policy," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 75(3), pages 789-808.
    44. Kydland, Finn E & Prescott, Edward C, 1977. "Rules Rather Than Discretion: The Inconsistency of Optimal Plans," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 85(3), pages 473-491, June.
    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. Marco Bassetto & Zhen Huo & José-Víctor Ríos-Rull, 2018. "Organizational Equilibrium with Capital," Working Paper Series WP-2018-20, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago.
    2. Partha Pratim DUBE, 2020. "Least Possible Time to Reach Targeted Profit Function under Unitary Transformation," Romanian Journal of Economics, Institute of National Economy, vol. 50(1(59)), pages 05-15, June.

    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. Martin Ellison & Charles Brendon, 2015. "Time-Consistent Institutional Design," 2015 Meeting Papers 495, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    2. Zhigang Feng, 2015. "Time‐consistent optimal fiscal policy over the business cycle," Quantitative Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 6(1), pages 189-221, March.
    3. Salvador Ortigueira & Joana Pereira, 2007. "Markov-Perfect Optimal Fiscal Policy: The Case of Unbalanced Budgets," Economics Working Papers ECO2007/41, European University Institute.
    4. Pierre-Edouard Collignon, 2021. "No Regret Fiscal Reforms," Working Papers 2021-20, Center for Research in Economics and Statistics.
    5. Ricardo Nunes & Davide Debortoli, 2007. "Political Disagreement, Lack of Commitment and the Level of Debt," 2007 Meeting Papers 725, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    6. Stefania Albanesi & Roc Armenter, 2012. "Intertemporal Distortions in the Second Best," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 79(4), pages 1271-1307.
    7. Vasilev, Aleksandar, 2013. "Fiscal policy in a Real-Business-Cycle model with labor-intensive government services and endogenous public sector wages and hours," EconStor Preprints 142338, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.
    8. Catarina Reis, 2013. "Taxation without commitment," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 52(2), pages 565-588, March.
    9. Acemoglu, Daron & Golosov, Mikhail & Tsyvinski, Aleh, 2011. "Political economy of Ramsey taxation," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 95(7-8), pages 467-475, August.
    10. Begoña Domínguez, 2020. "Sustaining Ramsey plans with one-period bonds," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 70(2), pages 387-410, September.
    11. Laczó, Sarolta & Rossi, Raffaele, 2020. "Time-consistent consumption taxation," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 114(C), pages 194-220.
    12. Gross, Till & Klein, Paul & Makris, Miltiadis, 2020. "Residence- and source-based capital taxation in open economies with infinitely-lived consumers," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 127(C).
    13. George Economides & Anastasios Rizos, 2021. "Optimal taxation: full-commitment versus time-consistent equilibrium," Economic Change and Restructuring, Springer, vol. 54(3), pages 717-753, August.
    14. Aguiar, Mark & Amador, Manuel, 2016. "Fiscal policy in debt constrained economies," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 161(C), pages 37-75.
    15. Katharina Greulich & Sarolta Laczó & Albert Marcet, 2023. "Pareto-Improving Optimal Capital and Labor Taxes," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 131(7), pages 1904-1946.
    16. Oscar Mauricio VALENCIA ARANA, 2006. "Imperfect Government Insurance and Treasury Securities Markets," Archivos de Economía 2814, Departamento Nacional de Planeación.
    17. Reis, Catarina, 2012. "Social discounting and incentive compatible fiscal policy," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 147(6), pages 2469-2482.
    18. Vasilev, Aleksandar, 2013. "Essays on Real Business Cycle Modeling and the Public Sector," EconStor Theses, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, number 130522, September.
    19. Debortoli, Davide & Nunes, Ricardo, 2010. "Fiscal policy under loose commitment," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 145(3), pages 1005-1032, May.
    20. Leeper, Eric M. & Leith, Campbell & Liu, Ding, 2021. "Optimal Time-Consistent Monetary, Fiscal and Debt Maturity Policy," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 117(C), pages 600-617.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Time consistency; Undominated policy; Ramsey policy;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D02 - Microeconomics - - General - - - Institutions: Design, Formation, Operations, and Impact
    • E61 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Macroeconomic Policy, Macroeconomic Aspects of Public Finance, and General Outlook - - - Policy Objectives; Policy Designs and Consistency; Policy Coordination

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:cfm:wpaper:1801. 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: Helen Power (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/cmlseuk.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.