Working Papers
January 1, 0001
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January 1, 0001
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January 1, 0001
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1992
May 1, 1992
Currency Substitution in Developing Countries: An Introduction
Description: This paper reviews the main policy and analytical issues related to currency substitution in developing countries. The paper discusses, first, whether currency substitution should be encouraged or not; second, how the presence of currency substitution affects the choice of nominal anchors in inflation stabilization programs; third, the effects of changes in the rate of growth of the money supply on the real exchange rate; fourth, the interaction between inflationary finance and currency substitution; and, finally, issues related to the empirical verification of the currency substitution hypothesis.
May 1, 1992
Fiscal Impulses and their Fiscal Impact
Description: Fiscal impulse measures are used in the WEO and elsewhere to indicate the changing impact of the budget on the economy. Such measures are intended to provide more accurate indications of whether the budget is becoming more or less expansionary than would just observing moments in the actual budget balance. However, they have been criticized for lacking an analytical rationale. This paper uses a simple framework to show that the fiscal impulse measure can be analytically derived. While this removes one source of criticism, the measure, nevertheless, should be used carefully when making inferences of fiscal impact.
May 1, 1992
The Optimal Rate of Money Creation in an Overlapping Generations Model: Numerical Simulations for the U.S. Economy
Description: This paper develops a large scale overlapping generations model and calibrates it for the U.S. economy. Simulations with the model show that the steady state welfare maximizing inflation rate may be positive, although the numerical results are not robust. It is also shown, however, that increases in the inflation rate are never Pareto efficient because during the transition to the new steady state at least some generations are made worse-off. Using an optimality criterion that takes into account the welfare of all generations, it is found that implementing Friedman’s rule is a Pareto superior policy, and that the efficiency gains derived from implementing such rule could be substantial.
May 1, 1992
Aggregation of Economic Indicators Across Countries: Exchange Rate versus PPP Based GDP Weights
Description: Relative GDP shares are frequently used as weights in aggregations. In order to ensure that these weights reflect countries’ shares in real output, GDP data in national currencies should be converted into a common numeraire currency at purchasing power parity (PPP) rates. A review of the empirical evidence on the relationship between exchange rates and prices suggests that market (or official) exchange rates are generally poor proxies for PPP rates. The paper examines the PPP-based GDP data generated by the International Comparison Program and compares aggregations with PPP- and exchange rate-based GDP weights.
May 1, 1992
Growth, Productivity, and the Rate of Returnon Capital
Description: This paper examines the ability of alternative classes of growth models to explain the historical experience of the U.S. economy. The potential returns to the U.S. from raising its investment rate in terms of both the level and growth rate of future output are then quantified. The long-run growth performance of the U.S. economy is found to be broadly consistent with the predictions of the neoclassical growth model. Endogenous growth models, which suggest a larger contribution of capital to growth and long-run effects of investment on the growth rate, do not seem to be supported by the data.
May 1, 1992
The Monetary Approach to the Exchange Rate: Rational Expectations, Long-Run Equilibrium and Forecasting
Description: We re-examine the monetary approach to the exchange rate from a number of perspectives, using monthly data on the deutschemark-dollar exchange rate. Using the Campbell-Shiller technique for testing present value models, we reject the restrictions imposed upon the data by the forward-looking rational expectations monetary model. We demonstrate, however, that the monetary model is validated as a long-run equilibrium condition. Moreover, imposing the long-run monetary model restrictions in a dynamic error correction framework leads to exchange rate forecasts which are superior to those generated by a random walk forecasting model.
Notes: Also published in Staff Papers, Vol. 40, No. 1, March 1993.
May 1, 1992
Currency Substitution and Inflation in Peru
Description: This paper shows that there is a long-run relationship between the expected rate of depreciation in the black-market-exchange rate and the ratio of domestic to foreign money in Peru; that is, the hypothesis of currency substitution can explain the behavior of real holdings of money in Peru. The paper also shows that, while the importance of currency substitution as a transmission mechanism through which domestic policies affected the dynamics of inflation was relatively small during a period of high but relatively stable inflation (January 1978-85), it became an important factor in the inflation process during the recent hyperinflation episode.