There has been much discussion about eliminating the 'zero lower bound' by eliminating paper currency. But such a radical and difficult approach as eliminating paper currency is not necessary. Much as during the Great Depression-when countries were able to revive their economies by going off the...

There has been much discussion about eliminating the 'zero lower bound' by eliminating paper currency. But such a radical and difficult approach as eliminating paper currency is not necessary. Much as during the Great Depression-when countries were able to revive their economies by going off the...

The experience of the Great Recession and its aftermath revealed that a lower bound on interestrates can be a serious obstacle for fighting recessions. However, the zero lower bound is not a law of nature;it is a policy choice. The central message of this paper is that with readily available...

"Yes. We construct a measure of aggregate technology change, controlling for varying utilization of capital and labor, non-constant returns and imperfect competition, and aggregation effects. On impact, when technology improves, input use and non-residential investment fall sharply. Output...

This paper proposes foundations and a methodology for survey-based tracking of well-being. First, we develop a theory in which utility depends on “fundamental aspects” of well-being, measurable with surveys. Second, drawing from psychologists, philosophers, and economists, we compile a...

This paper investigates whether Japanese people were happy and unhappy with the general election conducted on September 11, 2005, in which the Prime Minister, Koizumi, won a landslide victory. We conducted a large survey just after the election to ask people how happy they were and which party...