Policy Rules for Open Economies

Laurence Ball

NBER Working Paper No. 6760
Issued in October 1998
NBER Program(s):   ME   EFG   IFM

This paper examines the choice of a monetary-policy rule in a simple macroeconomic model. In a closed economy, the optimal policy is a output and inflation. In an open economy, the optimal rule changes in two ways. First, the policy instrument is a Conditions Index the exchange rate. Second, on the right side of the rule, inflation is replaced by filters out the transitory effects of exchange-rate movements. The model also implies that pure inflation targeting is dangerous in an open economy, because it creates large fluctuations in exchange rates and output. Targeting long-run inflation avoids this problem and produces a close approximation to the optimal instrument rule.

(887 K)

Published: Policy Rules for Open Economies, Laurence M. Ball, in Monetary Policy Rules (1999), University of Chicago Press

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