pioneering price level targeting the swedish experience 1931 1937 in september 1931 sweden became the first country to make the stabilization of the domestic price level the official goal of its monetary policy actually the only country that so far has adopted such an explicit price level target starting from the issues and concepts familiar from research and policy experience of inflation targeting as contrasted to price level targeting this paper examines the evolution of the swedish price level targeting in the 1930s we bring out a number of similarities and differences between price stabilization in the 1930s and in the 1990s

debt deleveraging and the liquidity trap a fisher minsky koo approach in this paper we present a simple new keynesian style model of debt driven slumps that is situations in which an overhang of debt on the part of some agents who are forced into rapid deleveraging is depressing aggregate demand making some agents debt constrained is a surprisingly powerful assumption fisherian debt deflation the possibility of a liquidity trap the paradox of thrift a keynesiantype multiplier and a rationale for expansionary fiscal policy all emerge naturally from the model we argue that this approach sheds considerable light both on current economic difficulties and on historical episodes including japan s lost decade now in its 18th year and the great depression itself

theoretical analysis regarding a zero lower bound on nominal interest rates this paper explores several issues concerning a possible zero lower bound zlb including its theoretical rationale the magnitude of effects of low sustained inflation on real interest rates the validity of analyzing monetary policy in models with no monetary variables and the dynamic stabilizing properties of taylor rules in a zlb context the most important argument however is that if the short nominal rate is immobilized at zero there nevertheless exists a route for monetary stabilization policy to be effective via the foreign exchange market its quantitative importance is examined in a calibrated optimizing open economy model

exchange rate policy and the zero bound on nominal interest rates in this paper we study the effectiveness of monetary policy in a severe recession and deflation when nominal interest rates are bounded at zero we compare two alternative proposals for ameliorating the effect of the zero bound an exchange rate peg and price level targeting we conduct this quantitative comparison in an empirical macroeconometric model of japan the united states and the euro area furthermore we use a stylized micro founded two country model to check our qualitative findings we find that both proposals succeed in generating inflationary expectations and work almost equally well under full credibility of monetary policy however price level targeting may be less effective under imperfect credibility because the announced price level target path is not directly observable

filling a gap in traditional transaction cost economics towards transaction benefits based analysis abstract this paper analyzes dyadic partnership formation between asymmetric buyers and specialized suppliers in the first part of the paper different economics of organization based approaches are evaluated their basic implications concerning the rise of partnerships are derived in the second part a dynamized transaction cost and benefit model is introduced to analyze the most critical elements of a typical partnership decision the final part is based on insights from practice and in depth interviews among 12 specialized suppliers and their four large incumbent partners in the information and telecommunications industry

the price of innovation new estimates of drug development costs the research and development costs of 68 randomly selected new drugs were obtained from a survey of 10 pharmaceutical firms these data were used to estimate the average pre tax cost of new drug development the costs of compounds abandoned during testing were linked to the costs of compounds that obtained marketing approval the estimated average out of pocket cost per new drug is us 403 million 2000 dollars capitalizing out of pocket costs to the point of marketing approval at a real discount rate of 11 yields a total pre approval cost estimate of us 802 million 2000 dollars when compared to the results of an earlier study with a similar methodology total capitalized costs were shown to have increased at an annual rate of 7 4 above general price inflation 2003 elsevier science b v all rights reserved

the case for open market purchases in a liquidity trap prevalent thinking about liquidity traps suggests that the perfect substitutability of money and bonds at a zero short term nominal interest rate renders open market operations ineffective for achieving macroeconomic stabilization goals we show that even were this the case there remains a powerful argument for large scale open market operations as a fiscal policy tool as we also demonstrate however this same reasoning implies that open market operations will be beneficial for stabilization as well even when the economy is expected to remain mired in a liquidity trap for some time thus the microeconomic fiscal benefits of open market operations in a liquidity trap go hand in hand with standard macroeconomic objectives motivated by japan s recent economic experience we use a dynamic general equilibrium model to assess the welfare impact of open market operations for an economy in japan s predicament we argue japan can achieve a substantial welfare improvement through large open market purchases of domestic government debt

time consistent collection of optimal seigniorage a unifying framework this paper reviews the existing literature on the time consistency problem of seigniorage collection when monetary policy is determined by optimal taxation considerations it develops a unifying accounting framework and suggests a general measure for seigniorage which encompasses the standard measures employed in the literature in addition the ex ante optimal solution to the optimal taxation problem is derived and interpreted in relation to the ramsey principle we show that the different recommendations of the public finance literature i e the friedman rule of optimal deflation moderately positive inflation and seigniorage maximizing inflation are specific solutions to the optimal taxation problem the paper continues with a formal illustration of the time consistency problem of the ex ante optimal policy and the characterization of the time consistent solution under discretion as possible solutions to the time consistency problem we consider reputational forces institutional reforms that establish central bank independence and specific ways of asset and debt management in particular it is formally shown that a modified version of the asset and debt management scheme suggested by persson persson and svensson is not only necessary but also sufficient for optimality although this did not hold in their model

average inflation targeting the analysis of this paper demonstrates that when the phillips curve has forward looking components a goal for average inflation i e targeting a j period average of one period inflation rates will cause inflation expectations to change in a way that improves the short run trade off faced by the monetary policymaker average inflation targeting is thus an example of a modified loss function which when implemented in a discretionary fashion results in more efficient outcomes from the standpoint of the true social objective inflation targeting under commitment than the discretionary pursuit of the true objective itself in purely forward looking models average inflation targeting is dominated by price level targeting but we also demonstrate in a micro founded model where the phillips curve has both forward and backward looking components that there are cases when the average inflation target provides more efficient outcomes than both ordinary one period inflation targeting and price level targeting

price level targeting vs inflation targeting a free lunch price level targeting without base drift and inflation targeting with base drift are compared under commitment and discretion with persistence in unemployment price level targeting is often said to imply more short run inflation variability and thereby more employment variability than inflation targeting counter to this conventional wisdom under discretion a price level target results in lower inflation variability than an inflation target if unemployment is at least moderately persistent a price level target also eliminates the inflation bias under discretion and as is well known reduces long term price variability society may be better off assigning a price level target to the central bank even if its preferences correspond to inflation targeting a price level target thus appears to have more advantages than commonly acknowledged

price stability with imperfect financial integration this paper studies whether the international monetary system can be affected by asymmetries in the cross country positions in the international financial markets i e the fact that some countries are large debtors while others are creditors an important channel that is explored is the interaction between international risk sharing and the stabilization role of monetary policy in each country the main finding is that the welfare costs of incomplete markets and the gains of deviating from a policy of price stability are increasing with the cross country asymmetries in the initial net international positions and in particular they become nonnegligible when the persistence of the shocks increases 1 of a permanent shift in steady state consumption for the welfare costs of incomplete markets and 0 2 for the gains of deviating from a policy of price stability when global imbalances become larger optimal monetary policy requires an increase in the volatilities of the real returns on assets and in particular of the nominal interest rates which should happen to be more correlated across countries

inflation forecast targeting implementing and monitoring inflation targets abstract inflation targeting is shown to imply inflation forecast targeting the central bank s inflation forecast becomes an explicit intermediate target inflation forecast targeting simplifies both implementation and monitoring of monetary policy the weight on output stabilization determines how quickly the inflation forecast is adjusted towards the inflation target money growth or exchange rate targeting is generally inferior than inflation targeting and leads to higher inflation variability commitment to target rules may be better than commitment to instrument rules

the un importance of forward looking behavior in price specifications the seminal work of edmund s phelps 1978 john b taylor 1980 and guillermo a calvo 1983 developed forward looking models of price determination that imparted inertia to the price level these models incorporate expectations of future prices and excess demand by imposing constraints typically lag lead symmetry constraints that force future variables to enter the specification in this paper the author tests the empirical significance of future prices in specifications like those of taylor he finds that expectations of future prices are empirically unimportant in explaining price and inflation behavior however the dynamics of a model that includes a purely backward looking inflation specification differ substantially and not altogether pleasingly from those with a forward looking specification copyright 1997 by ohio state university press

global policy at the zero lower bound in a large scale dsge model abstract this paper analyses whether fiscal policies can alleviate the effects of a global recession that drives interest rates to the zero lower bound additionally we study the benefits of international coordination the analysis is carried out using a dynamic general equilibrium model of the global economy eagle model we consider that the fiscal shocks are temporary and that fiscal policy retains full credibility at all times in this setup we find significant non linearities in a zero lower bound situation that amplify the effects of fiscal shocks compared to the non zero lower bound case international coordination is helpful but does not play a major role in the results

price level versus inflation targeting abstract this paper shows that price level targeting outperforms inflation targeting in the standard new keynesian model under the assumption that the central bank is forced to operate in an environment characterized by discretion in the benchmark case with no persistence in the shocks the commitment solution can be fully replicated intuitively price level targeting introduces history dependence and a stationary level of prices both of which are prominent features of the commitment solution

overcoming the zero bound on nominal interest rates with negative interest on currency gesell s solution an economy is in a liquidity trap when monetary policy cannot influence either real or nominal variables of interest a necessary condition for this is that the short nominal interest rate is constrained by its lower bound typically zero the paper considers two small analytical models one old keynesian the other new keynesian possessing equilibria where not only the short nominal interest rate but nominal interest rates at all maturities can be stuck at their zero lower bound when the authorities remove the zero nominal interest rate floor by adopting an augmented monetary rule that systematically keeps the nominal interest rate on base money including currency at or below the nominal interest rate on non monetary instruments the lower bound equilibria are eliminated thus allowing an economic system to avoid the trap or to escape from it this rule will involve paying negative interest on currency that is imposing a carry tax on currency an idea first promoted by gesell the administration costs associated with a currency carry tax must be set against the benefits of potentially lower shoe leather costs and lower menu costs which are made possible by the its introduction there are also output gap avoidance benefits from eliminating the zero lower bound trap

sticky prices in the euro area a summary of new micro evidence this paper summarises the vast evidence on micro price setting recently obtained for euro area countries we consider studies with micro data on consumer and producer prices as well as survey information the main findings are 1 prices in the euro area are sticky and stickier than in the us 2 downward price rigidity is only slightly more marked than upward price rigidity 3 heterogeneity and asymmetries are observed in price setting and 4 the relevance of theories that explain price stickiness such as implicit or explicit contracts marginal costs and coordination failure is confirmed whereas menu costs pricing thresholds and costly information explanations are judged much less relevant by firms jel c25 d40 e31

overcoming the zero bound on interest rate policy the paper proposes three options for overcoming the zero bound on interest rate policy a carry tax on money open market operations in long bonds and monetary transfers a variable carry tax on electronic bank reserves could enable a central bank to target negative nominal interest rates a carry tax could be imposed on currency to create more leeway to make interest rates negative quantitative policy monetary transfers and open market purchases of long bonds could stimulate the economy by creating liquidity broadly defined a central bank needs more fiscal support than usual from the treasury to pursue quantitative policy at the interest rate floor

conducting monetary policy at very low short term interest rates can monetary policy committees accustomed to describing their plans and actions in terms of the level of a short term nominal interest rate find effective means of conducting and communicating their policies when that rate is zero or close to zero the very low levels of interest rates in japan switzerland and the united states in recent years have stimulated much interesting research on this question and have led some central banks to make changes in their operating procedures and communications strategies in this paper we will give a brief overview of current thinking on the conduct of monetary policy when short term interest rates are very low or even zero monetary policy works for the most part by influencing the prices and yields of financial assets which in turn affect economic decisions and thus the evolution of the economy when the short term policy rate is at or near zero the conventional means of effecting monetary ease lowering the target for the policy rate is no longer feasible however it would be a mistake to think that monetary policy was impotent we discuss three strategies for stimulating the economy at an unchanged level of the policy rate these involve i providing assurance to investors that short rates will be kept lower in the future than they currently expect ii changing the relative supplies of securities in the marketplace by altering the composition of the central bank s balance sheet and iii increasing the size of the central bank s balance sheet beyond the level needed to set the short term policy rate at zero quantitative easing we also discuss the costs and benefits of very low interest rates an issue that bears on the question of whether the central bank should take the policy rate all the way to zero before undertaking alternative policies

characterization of the optimal tax on money when it functions as a medium of exchange abstract this paper compares the relative efficiency of the implicit taxation of money and the explicit taxation of real commodities to finance a given amount of government expenditures in the model used money has the property of reducing transactions costs a sufficient condition for a tax on money to be welfare dominated by a linear tax on consumption expenditures is characterized in terms of a few parameters very familiar in macroeconomics this characterization is especially useful in the cases of heterogeneous consumers and increasing returns to scale in transactions since then the optimal tax on money may in principle be positive

new keynesian economics and the phillips curve models with sticky prices are an important part of new keynesian economics the author shows that several of the new keynesian models imply a formulation that is similar to the expectations augmented phillips curve of milton friedman and edmund phelps he then presents new estimates of the new keynesian phillips curve the author uses two proxies for price expectations survey based measures and an econometric based measure originally developed by bennett mccallum 1976 overall the results are consistent with the model but the survey based results are more precise suggesting that the surveys may be better measures of actual expectations copyright 1995 by ohio state university press

unconventional fiscal policy at the zero bound when the zero lower bound on nominal interest rates binds monetary policy cannot provide appropriate stimulus we show that in the standard new keynesian model tax policy can deliver such stimulus at no cost and in a time consistent manner there is no need to use inecient policies such as

open innovation a real option to restore value to the biopharmaceutical r d abstract the pharmaceutical landscape has changed and new business models based on alliances are increasingly being adopted in this industry biotechnology advances have pushed this development and pooling complementary resources coming from incumbents and newcomers is a key skill to succeed these are the premises for a quick spread of the open innovation oi paradigm in this industry rd to achieve this goal the authors propose a closed form model that is easy to implement to evaluate the oi initiative for selecting an optimal rd i e licensing in or not and the self financing policy the proposed model can be easily implemented into a spreadsheet and the inputs needed to run it are usually requested to evaluate projects using the most used net present value based methods moreover some parameters of the model allow strategic aspects to be considered for example the nature of the project core non core the impending project phase and the risk sharing opportunity the results of the developed numerical example show that the selected portfolio is well balanced in terms of development stages core non core therapeutic areas and licensing in an inbound open innovation solution is preferred in the case of products at their early stages of development

the perils of taylor rules abstract since john taylor s 1993 carnegie rochester conf ser publ policy39 195 214 seminal paper a large literature has argued that active interest rate feedback rules that is rules that respond to increases in inflation with a more than one for one increase in the nominal interest rate are stabilizing in this paper we argue that once the zero bound on nominal interest rates is taken into account active interest rate feedback rules can easily lead to unexpected consequences specifically we show that even if the steady state at which monetary policy is active is locally the unique equilibrium typically there exist an infinite number of equilibrium trajectories originating arbitrarily close to that steady state that converge to a liquidity trap that is a steady state in which the nominal interest rate is near zero and inflation is possibly negative journal of economic literature classification numbers e52 e31 e63

the outsourcing of r d through acquisitions in the pharmaceutical industry abstract we examine the performance of 160 pharmaceutical acquisitions from 1994 to 2001 and find evidence that on average acquirers realize significant positive returns these returns are positively correlated with prior acquirer access to information about the research and development activities at target firms and a superior negotiating position a unique desperation index is employed to determine the current status of a firm s internal productivity we find that firms experiencing declines in internal productivity or which are more desperate are more likely to engage in an outsourcing type acquisition in an effort to replenish their research pipelines

in search for complementarities partnering of technology intensive small firms abstract technology intensive markets are characterised by high levels of technological and market uncertainty severe competition and globalisation small companies use cooperative relations to meet these uncertainties motivation for partnering has been studied in different contexts but the sme viewpoint is still relatively an unexplored area especially in technology intensive fields the purpose of the paper is to explain how the small firms inadequacies in resources affect their partnering needs on the basis of the theoretical perspectives hypotheses are constructed and empirically tested with data from 87 firms from the finnish infocom sector the results support the hypotheses only partly but some interesting conclusions can be drawn from the data

governance forms drivers in bio pharmaceutical inter firm relationships abstract since the first theoretical papers on transaction cost economy several studies have addressed the problem of designing governance forms in inter firm relationship scholars have deeply investigated the problem and several theories have been proposed to face with it the biopharmaceutical industry is one of the most interesting testbeds for understanding dynamics and rationality of governance forms in ifrs indeed in this industry the advent of the biotechnology has not been disruptive as in other industries so that the newcomers the biotech companies and the incumbents the pharmaceutical ones have incurred in several types of ifrs such as licensing agreements non equity alliances equity alliances and mergers and acquisitions thus several papers have tried to investigate what kind of drivers influence the choice of the governance form in this industry but most of them have focused on general characteristics of inter firm agreements such as the investment specificity the number of prior ties the technology distance and so forth differently from other researches in this paper we focus on specific characteristics of ifrs in the biopharma industry and we build a theoretical framework consisting of 13 drivers that are able to influence the governance mode of ifrs in this industry we test our theoretical framework through an explorative empirical analysis even if more confirmative empirical analysis is needed the empirical results evidence the validity of the theoretical framework proposed in this paper and provide some interesting managerial implications

tax reform and labour market performance in the euro area a simulation based analysis using the new area wide model in this paper we employ a calibrated two country version of the new area wide model nawm developed at the european central bank to examine the potential benefits and spillovers of reducing labour market distortions caused by euro area tax structures our analysis shows that lowering tax distortions to levels prevailing in the united states would result in an increase in hours worked and output by more than 10 at the same time tax reductions would have positive spillovers to the euro area s trade partners bolstering the case for tax reforms from a global perspective finally we illustrate that in the presence of heterogeneous households distributional effects may be of importance when gauging the impact of tax reforms

an extreme keynesian macro economic model with formal micro economic foundations this paper presents a formal general equilibrium model of a monetary economy in which agents decision rules are derived from the underlying preferences technology endowments and information firms face kinked demand curves for the reason given by j stiglitz 1979 customers know the price at their current firm but not at other firms the results are compatible with extreme keynesian macroeconomic predictions as presented by g woglom 1982 there is no automatic tendency to full employment and a change in the money supply may cause a permanent change in real output with no change in prices

governance and uncertainty the trade off between administrative control and commitment this study elaborates upon the motives for initiating equity based collaborations vs acquisition of another firm already having a desired technology we characterize both minority direct investments and joint ventures as options to defer either internal development or acquisition of a target firm in domains where learning about growth opportunities dominates investment activity this incremental mode of governance economizes on the cost of committing resources to a technology with an uncertain value using a sample of 402 transactions in the biotechnology industry we find strong support for the theoretical model the findings suggest that the cost of commitment in the face of technological uncertainty may offset the administrative benefits of hierarchical governance 1998 john wiley sons ltd

escaping from a liquidity trap and deflation the foolproof way and others existing proposals to escape from a liquidity trap and deflation including my foolproof way are discussed in the light of the optimal way to escape the optimal way involves three elements 1 an explicit central bank commitment to a higher future price level 2 a concrete action that demonstrates the central bank s commitment induces expectations of a higher future price level and jump starts the economy and 3 an exit strategy that specifies when and how to get back to normal a currency depreciation is a direct consequence of expectations of a higher future price level and hence an excellent indicator of those expectations furthermore an intentional currency depreciation and a crawling peg as in the foolproof way can implement the optimal way and in particular induce the desired expectations of a higher future price level i conclude that the foolproof way is likely to work well for japan which is in a liquidity trap now as well as for the euro area and the united states in case either would fall into a liquidity trap in the future

monetary policy and the zero bound to interest rates a review1 this paper reviews the literature on what the zero bound to nominal interest rates implies for the conduct of monetary policy the aim is to evaluate the risks of hitting the zero bound and to evaluate policies that are said to be able to reduce that risk or policies that are proposed as means of helping the economy escape if it is in a zero bound trap i conclude that policies aimed at cure are arguably more uncertain tools than those aimed at prevention so prevention is a less risky strategy for policymakers but since the risks of hitting the zero bound seem quite small anyway and the risks of encountering a deflationary spiral smaller still it is conceivable that inflation objectives that typify modern monetary regimes already have more than enough insurance built into them to deal with the zero bound problem

the perils of nominal targets a monetary authority can be committed to pursuing an inflation price level or nominal gdp target yet systematically fail to achieve the prescribed goal constrained by the zero lower bound on the policy rate the monetary authority is unable to implement its objectives when private sector expectations stray far enough from the target low inflation expectations become self fulfilling resulting in an additional markov equilibrium in which the monetary authority falls short of the nominal target average output is below its efficient level and the policy rate is typically low introducing a stabilization goal for long term nominal rates can implement a unique markov equilibrium without fully compromising stabilization policy

is there a fiscal free lunch in a liquidity trap this paper uses a dsge model to examine the eects of an expansion in government spending in a liquidity trap the spending multiplier can be much larger than in the normal situation if the liquidity trap is very persistent and scal stimulus can be rapidly implemented moreover the budgetary costs may be minimal as the large response of output boosts tax revenues allowing for something close to a scal free lunch however we caution that the multiplier may be much smaller under plausible implementation lags for many types of public spending and or if the liquidity trap lasts less than two years in addition because the marginal impact of scal expansion decreases in the scale of the outlay it is crucial to distinguish between average and marginal multipliers

credible commitment to optimal escape from a liquidity trap the role of the balance sheet of an independent central bank we start from two empirical facts 1 central banks target cpi inflation 2 independent central banks are concerned about their balance sheet and the level of their capital the first fact makes it difficult for a central bank to implement the optimal escape from a liquidity trap because it makes a commitment to overshoot the inflation target not credible we show that the second fact helps to solve this credibility problem the optimal policy can take the form of a currency depreciation combined with a crawling peg a policy advocated by svensson as the foolproof way to escape from a liquidity trap jel e52 f31 f41 this paper starts from two empirical facts 1 central banks target infl ation measured by the consumer price index cpi 2 independent central banks are concerned about their balance sheet and the level of their capital we provide evidence for these facts below the first fact adds to the well known credibility problem of the optimal escape from a liquidity trap the second fact provides a mechanism through which the credibility problem can be solved and the optimal escape

unraveling the process of creative destruction complementary assets and incumbent survival in the typesetter industry when radical technological change transforms an industry established firms sometimes fail drastically and are displaced by new entrants yet other times survive and prosper drawing upon an unusually rich data set that covers the technological and competitive history of the typesetter industry from 1886 to 1990 this paper uses a combination of quantitative and qualitative analysis to unravel this process of creative destruction it argues that the ultimate commercial performance of incumbents vs new entrants is driven by the balance and interaction of three factors investment technical capabilities and appropriability through specialized complementary assets in this industry specialized complementary assets played a crucial role in buffering incumbents from the effects of competence destruction and an analysis that examined investment or technical capabilities in isolation would have led to misleading results this work thus highlights the importance of considering multiple perspectives when examining the competitive implications of technological change 1997 by john wiley sons ltd

targeting nominal income growth or inflation within a simple new keynesian model emphasizing forward looking behavior of private agents i evaluate optimal nominal income growth targeting versus optimal inflation targeting when the economy is mainly subject to shocks that do not involve monetary policy trade offs for society inflation targeting is preferable otherwise nominal income growth targeting may be superior because it induces inertial policy making which improves the inflation output gap trade off somewhat paradoxically inflation targeting may be relatively less favorable the more society dislikes inflation and the more persistent are the effects of inflation generating shocks jel e42 e52 f58

new developments in monetary economics two ghosts two eccentricities a fallacy a mirage and a mythos monetary theory and policy are part of intertemporal public finance the two ghosts are the liquidity trap and the real balance effect the eccentricities are negative nominal interest rates and the helicopter drop of money the fallacy is the fiscal theory of the price level a logically inconsistent theory of the link between the government s intertemporal budget constraint and the general price level the mirage is the prediction that financial deregulation and technical change in the payments and settlements technology will cause monetary policy to lose its capacity to influence even nominal economic variables mythos refers to the independent central bank

inflation and welfare in the steady state this is a paper on expected inflation and welfare in steady state equilibrium the demand for money is an inventory demand with an endogenous payment period the clower constraint is not imposed higher inflation reduces welfare by reducing consumption as people devote more of their real income to maintaining lower average money holdings high inflation does not necessarily promote an increase in the capital stock the mundell tobin effect is absent the policy conclusion is standard deflate at the rate of time preference because capital is held socially optimal consumption falls short of its golden rule level if inside money is allowed it drives out fiat money and welfare is again at a maximum

new keynesian versus old keynesian government spending multipliers renewed interest in fiscal policy has increased the use of quantitative models to evaluate policy because of modelling uncertainty it is essential that policy evaluations be robust to alternative assumptions we find that models currently being used in practice to evaluate fiscal policy stimulus proposals are not robust government spending multipliers in an alternative empirically estimated and widely cited new keynesian model are much smaller than in these old keynesian models the estimated stimulus is extremely small with gdp and employment effects only one sixth as large and with private sector employment impacts likely to be even smaller we investigate the sensitivity of our findings with regard to the response of monetary policy the zero bound on nominal interest rates and the inclusion of an empirically relevant degree of rule of thumb behaviour in the new keynesian model in addition we relate our findings using estimated structural macroeconomic models to the recent literature using reduced form regression techniques