Is inflation targeting dead? Central Banking After the Crisis - Vox
Is inflation targeting dead? Central Banking After the Crisis - Vox
Is inflation targeting dead? Central Banking After the Crisis - Vox
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Monetary targetry: Might Carneymake a difference?Charles A.E. Goodhart, Melanie Baker and JonathanAshworthLondon School of Economics; Morgan Stanley; Morgan StanleyThe Bank of England’s Governor-elect has argued for a switch to a nominal GDPtarget. This column points out problems with nominal GDP targets, especially in levels.Among o<strong>the</strong>r issues, nominal GDP <strong>targeting</strong> means that uncertainty surrounding futurereal growth rates compounds uncertainty on future <strong>inflation</strong> rates. Thus <strong>the</strong> switch islikely to raise uncertainty about future <strong>inflation</strong> and weaken <strong>the</strong> anchoring of <strong>inflation</strong>expectations.The economic recovery from <strong>the</strong> 2008/9 crisis has been depressingly slow in <strong>the</strong> UK, asin many o<strong>the</strong>r developed countries. Fur<strong>the</strong>r fiscal expansion is constrained by concernsabout <strong>the</strong> extraordinary (for peace-time) scale of <strong>the</strong> public sector deficit and rise in<strong>the</strong> debt/GDP ratio. Hence politicians, and many o<strong>the</strong>r commentators, are looking tomonetary policy to play an even more aggressive role in getting us out of our presentstagnation.It is in this context that particular attention has been paid by <strong>the</strong> British press, and, itwould seem, <strong>the</strong> Treasury to a speech given by Mark Carney, <strong>the</strong> Governor-elect of <strong>the</strong>Bank of England, in Toronto on December 11, 2012. In this he argued that, if exceptionalstimulus needed to be given, <strong>the</strong> best method could be to adopt a (temporary) target for<strong>the</strong> level of nominal GDP, whereas most o<strong>the</strong>r UK proponents of nominal GDP targetry,such as Sir Samuel Brittan and Lord Skidelsky, have been advocating a target for <strong>the</strong>growth rate of NGDP.44