This article shows that the "risk premium" shock in Smets and Wouters (2007) can be interpreted as a structural shock to the demand for safe and liquid assets such as short-term US Treasury securities. Several implications of this interpretation are discussed.

We show that a .scal expansion by the core economies of the euro area would have a large and positive impact on periphery GDP assuming that policy rates remain low for a prolonged period. Under our preferred model speci.cation, an expansion of core government spending equal to one percent of...

We propose a novel framework where forward guidance (FG) is endogenously determined. Our model assumes that a monetary authority solves an optimal policy problem under commitment at the zero-lower bound. FG derives from two sources: 1. from commiting to keep interest rates low at the exit of the...