This paper develops a welfare-based model of monetary policy in an open economy. We focus on the extent to which monetary policy should be employed in maintaining the exchange rate. The traditional approach maintains that exchange rate flexibility is desirable in the presence of real...

This Paper makes two main points. First, irrespective of nominal exchange rate arrangements, the real exchange rate always floats – if not through nominal exchange rate adjustment, then through price change. Further, because prices and wages tend to be sticky, the adjustment of real exchange...

This paper attempts to identify the sources of real exchange rate fluctuations since the collapse of the Bretton Woods period. We use a structural VAR model with recursive long-run restrictions to decompose the real exchange rate series into three components, associated with supply, demand and...

A classic argument for flexible exchange rates is that the exchange rate plays a ‘shock-absorber' role in an open economy hit by country specific shocks. This Paper presents a sharp counterexample to this argument within a very simple open economy model. Countries are subject to unpredictable...

In this paper I investigate the relationships between wage adjustment, competitiveness, macroeconomic policy and aggregate fluctuations in a small open economy. Based on a model of an economy producing both traded and non-traded goods, and assuming that the traded goods sector is competitive...

This paper presents a compact derivation of the determinants of changes in the equilibrium real exchange rate (the price index of non-traded goods relative to traded goods) in a small open economy with any number of goods and factors. It is shown that the change in the real exchange rate equals...

It is well known that the neoclassical model does not generate comovement among macroeconomic aggregates in response to news about future total factor productivity. We show that this problem is generally more severe in open economy versions of the neoclassical model. We present an open economy...

The recent volatility in global commodity prices and in the price of oil, in particular, has created renewed interest in the question of how monetary policy makers should respond to oil price fluctuations. In this paper, we discuss why this question is ill-posed and has no general answer. The...

We examine optimal policy in a two-country model with uncertainty and learning, where monetary policy actions affect the real economy through the real exchange rate channel. Our results show that whether policy should be cautious or activist depends on the size of one country relative to...