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Who Killed the Phillips Curve? A Murder Mystery

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Abstract

Is the Phillips curve dead? If so, who killed it? Conventional wisdom has it that the sound monetary policy since the 1980s not only conquered the Great Inflation, but also buried the Phillips curve itself. This paper provides an alternative explanation: labor market policies that have eroded worker bargaining power might have been the source of the demise of the Phillips curve. We develop what we call the "Kaleckian Phillips curve", the slope of which is determined by the bargaining power of trade unions. We show that a nearly 90 percent reduction in inflation volatility is possible even without any changes in monetary policy when the economy transitions from equal shares of power between workers and firms to a new balance in which firms dominate. In addition, we show that the decline of trade union power reduces the share of monopoly rents appropriated by workers, and thus helps explain the secular decline of labor share, and the rise of profit share. We provide time series and cross sectional evidence.

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  • David Ratner & Jae W. Sim, 2022. "Who Killed the Phillips Curve? A Murder Mystery," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2022-028, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    • Handle: RePEc:fip:fedgfe:2022-28
    DOI: 10.17016/FEDS.2022.028
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    Cited by:

    1. Juan C. Córdoba & Anni T. Isojärvi & Haoran Li, 2023. "Endogenous Bargaining Power and Declining Labor Compensation Share," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2023-030, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    2. Jordà, Òscar & Nechio, Fernanda, 2023. "Inflation and wage growth since the pandemic," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 156(C).
    3. Fontanari, Claudia & Levrero, Enrico Sergio & Romaniello, Davide, 2024. "A composite index for workers’ bargaining power and the inflation rate in the United States, 1960–2018," Structural Change and Economic Dynamics, Elsevier, vol. 70(C), pages 682-698.
    4. Mark Setterfield, 2023. "Inflation and distribution during the post-COVID recovery: a Kaleckian approach," Journal of Post Keynesian Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 46(4), pages 587-611, October.
    5. Wildauer, Rafael & Kohler, Karsten & Aboobaker, Adam & Guschanski, Alexander, 2023. "Energy price shocks, conflict inflation, and income distribution in a three-sector model," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 127(PB).
    6. Rolim, Lilian & Carvalho, Laura & Lang, Dany, 2024. "Monetary policy rules and the inequality-augmented Phillips curve," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 139(C).
    7. Brzozowski, Michał & Siwińska-Gorzelak, Joanna, 2024. "Did robots make wages less responsive to unemployment?," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 209(C).
    8. Stamegna, Marco, 2022. "Induced innovation, the distributive cycle, and the changing pattern of labour productivity cyclicality: a SVAR analysis for the US economy," MPRA Paper 113855, University Library of Munich, Germany.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Bargaining power; Profits; Inflation dynamics;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • E31 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Price Level; Inflation; Deflation
    • E32 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Business Fluctuations; Cycles
    • E52 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit - - - Monetary Policy

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