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The Welfare Cost Of Inflation Risk Under Imperfect Insurance

Author

Listed:
  • Olivier Allais

    (Laboratoire de recherche sur la Consommation - INRA - Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique)

  • Yann Algan

    (ECON - Département d'économie (Sciences Po) - Sciences Po - Sciences Po - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique)

  • Edouard Challe

    (CEREG - CEREG - Centre d'Etudes et de Recherches sur l'Espace Germanophone - EA 4223 - Université Sorbonne Nouvelle - Paris 3 - UPN - Université Paris Nanterre)

  • Xavier Ragot

    (PSE - Paris School of Economics - UP1 - Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne - ENS-PSL - École normale supérieure - Paris - PSL - Université Paris Sciences et Lettres - EHESS - École des hautes études en sciences sociales - ENPC - École des Ponts ParisTech - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - INRAE - Institut National de Recherche pour l’Agriculture, l’Alimentation et l’Environnement, PSE - Paris-Jourdan Sciences Economiques - ENS-PSL - École normale supérieure - Paris - PSL - Université Paris Sciences et Lettres - INRA - Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique - EHESS - École des hautes études en sciences sociales - ENPC - École des Ponts ParisTech - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique)

Abstract

What are the costs of inflation fluctuations and who bears those costs? In this paper, we investigate this question by means of a quantitative incomplete-market, heterogenous-agent model wherein households hold real and nominal assets and are subject to both idiosyncratic labor income shocks and aggregate inflation risk. A key feature of our analysis is a nonhomothetic speci cation for households' preferences towards money and consumption goods. Unlike traditional speci cations, ours allows the model to reproduce the broad features of the distribution of monetary assets (in addition to being consistent with the distribution of nonmonetary assets). Inflation risk is found to generate signifi cant welfare losses for most households, i.e., between 1 and 1.5 percent of permanent consumption. The loss is small or even negative for households at the very top of the productivity and/or wealth distribution.

Suggested Citation

  • Olivier Allais & Yann Algan & Edouard Challe & Xavier Ragot, 2015. "The Welfare Cost Of Inflation Risk Under Imperfect Insurance," SciencePo Working papers Main hal-01157168, HAL.
    • Handle: RePEc:hal:spmain:hal-01157168
    Note: View the original document on HAL open archive server: https://hal.science/hal-01157168
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Curran, Michael & Dressler, Scott J., 2020. "Preferences, inflation, and welfare," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 130(C).

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Money-in-the-utility; incomplete markets; inflation risk; welfare.;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • E21 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Consumption; Saving; Wealth
    • E32 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Business Fluctuations; Cycles
    • E41 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Money and Interest Rates - - - Demand for Money

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