We analyze the welfare impact of greater wage flexibility in the presence of an occasionally binding zero lower bound (ZLB) constraint on the nominal interest rate. We show that the ZLB constraint generally amplifies the adverse effects of greater wage flexibility on welfare when the central...

Introducing bounded rationality into a standard consumption based asset pricing model with a representative agent and time separable preferences strongly improves empirical performance. Learning causes momentum and mean reversion of returns and thereby excess volatility, persistence of...

We study a standard consumption based asset pricing model with rational investors who entertain subjective prior beliefs about price behavior. Optimal behavior then dictates that investors learn about price behavior from past price observations. We show that this imparts momentum and mean...

When is it optimal for a government to default on its legal repayment oblig- ations? We answer this question for a small open economy with domestic production risk in which the government optimally finances itself by issuing non-contingent debt. We show that Ramsey optimal policies occasionally...

The booms and busts in U.S. stock prices over the post-war period can to a large extent be explained by fluctuations in investors' subjective capital gains expectations. Survey measures of these expectations display excessive optimism at market peaks and excessive pessimism at market throughs....