This paper outlines how the Reserve Bank of New Zealand's Forecasting and Policy System (FPS) is used to prepare the quarterly economic projections. In addition to a very brief overview of the system, the paper focuses on four key issues. First, the current methodology for incorporating a...

In this paper, stochastic simulations of the Reserve Bank of New Zealand's new macroeconomic model, FPS, are used to examine the issue of which price index monetary policy should stabilise in a small open economy. Under the class of policy rules considered, targeting a measure of domestic...

Uncertainty in applied macroeconomic policy analysis arises from three distinct sources. The first, often referred to as model uncertainty, arises because the models used for policy analysis are simple abstractions of the complex behavioural interactions that occur in an economy. The second...

The Treasury and the Reserve Bank of New Zealand hosted a conference during December 10-11, 2007 on the business cycle, housing and the role of policy. Research presented included investigations of recent shocks to the New Zealand business cycle, including the role of housing and the influence...

This article reviews how monetary policy evolved during the recession of the early 1990s and that in 1998, and discusses some of the lessons the Bank has learned.

New Zealand’s medium-to-longer-run growth prospects and general standard of living critically depend upon its labour productivity performance. Relative to most OECD countries, the level of labour productivity in New Zealand is low and,when measured as GDP per worker, the historic growth...

This paper is concerned with how stylised differences in monetary policy transmission mechanisms and product and labour market rigidities between the US and euro-area economies affect their resilience to temporary shocks. To address this issue, a small general equilibrium model with long-run...

This working paper describes a medium-term reference scenario for the OECD based on the shortterm projections described in <I>OECD Economic Outlook No.74</I>. OECD-wide real GDP is projected to expand at 2¾ per cent <I>per annum</I> between 2006 and 2009 and the area-wide rate of unemployment to fall below 6...</i></i>

Simple rules for guiding monetary policy actions have been shown to achieve policy objectives effectively. In many of these simple rules, policy prescriptions depend on the economy's level of potential output. However, potential output is unobservable and is estimated with uncertainty. We...