VECTOR AUTOREGRESSION EVIDENCE ON MONETARISM: A FOCUS ON SOME DEVELOPING ECONOMIES IN SOUTH ASIA

The objective of this paper is to test the validity of two views of monetarism in Bangladesh, India, and Pakistan. A Structural Vector Autoregressive (SVAR) model is developed and the objective is accomplished by conducting Granger causality tests and estimating variance decompositions and impulse response functions. The first view of monetarism that changes in the quantity of money cause, lead and are positively related to changes in prices at least in the medium to long time horizon is supported in Bangladesh, India, and Pakistan. The second view of monetarism that changes in the quantity of money cause, lead and are positively related to changes in output at least in the short to medium time horizon is not supported. The implication of such a result is that an expansionary monetary policy only fuels prices with insignificant effects on output. It supports the view of real business cycle theorists who postulate that policy changes only affect prices.