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Author:Lansing, Kevin J. 

Journal Article
Tax structure, optimal fiscal policy, and the business cycle

The development of a real business cycle model in which government fiscal variables such as tax rates and public expenditures are endogenous. The authors characterize the "optimal" behavior of these policy variables over the business cycle and relate this behavior to movements in private-sector variables like output, consumption, labor hours, and investment.
Economic Review , Volume 30 , Issue Q IV , Pages 2-14

Working Paper
Explaining the Boom-Bust Cycle in the U.S. Housing Market: A Reverse-Engineering Approach

We use a simple quantitative asset pricing model to ?reverse-engineer? the sequences of stochastic shocks to housing demand and lending standards that are needed to exactly replicate the boom-bust patterns in U.S. household real estate value and mortgage debt over the period 1995 to 2012. Conditional on the observed paths for U.S. disposable income growth and the mortgage interest rate, we consider four different specifications of the model that vary according to the way that household expectations are formed (rational versus moving average forecast rules) and the maturity of the mortgage ...
Working Paper Series , Paper 2015-2

Journal Article
R-star, Uncertainty, and Monetary Policy

Investors? demand for safe assets tends to increase when there?s more uncertainty, as in recessions. Consistent with this idea, short-term movements in the natural rate of interest, or r-star, are negatively correlated with an index of macroeconomic uncertainty. This relationship may be relevant for assessing monetary policy. An estimated policy rule that incorporates both r-star and the uncertainty index can largely reproduce the path of the federal funds rate since 1988, except during periods when policy was constrained by the zero lower bound.
FRBSF Economic Letter

Working Paper
Some new variance bounds for asset prices: a comment

Engel (2005) derives a theoretical variance inequality involving the change in equilibrium stock prices Var ( p) : Assuming that stock prices are "cum-dividend" and that investors are risk neutral, he shows that Var ( p) must be greater than or equal to the variance of the "perfect foresight" (or "ex post rational") price change Var ( p*) ; where p* is computed from the discounted stream of subsequent realized dividends. This paper expands the analysis to consider "ex-divdend" prices and risk aversion in a standard Lucas-type asset pricing model. I show that the direction of the ...
Working Paper Series , Paper 2010-29

Journal Article
Output and inflation: a 100-year perspective

FRBSF Economic Letter

Working Paper
Dynamic optimal fiscal and monetary policy in a business cycle model with income redistribution

An estimation of an optimal program of distortionary taxes, money growth, and borrowing to finance a stream of expenditures based on a real business cycle model in which distribution issues between the rich and poor play a fundamental role in policy decisions.
Working Papers (Old Series) , Paper 9308

Journal Article
Federal Reserve credibility and inflation scares

We develop a simple, quantitative model of the U.S. economy to demonstrate how an "inflation scare " may occur when the Federal Reserve lacks full credibility. In particular, we show that the long-term nominal interest rate may undergo a sudden increase if an adverse movement in the inflation rate triggers a deterioration in the public's beliefs about the Federal Reserve's commitment to maintaining low inflation in the future. We find that simulations from our model capture some observed patterns of U.S. interest rates in the 1980s.
Economic Review

Working Paper
Learning About a Shift in Trend Output: Implications for Monetary Policy and Inflation

This paper develops a small forward-looking macroeconomic model where the Federal Reserve estimates the level of potential output in real time by running a regression on past output data. The Fed’s perceived output gap is used as an input to the monetary policy rule while the true output gap influences aggregate demand and inflation. I investigate the consequences of two postulated shifts in the growth rate of U.S. potential output: the first occurs in the early-1970s and the second in the mid-1990s. Initially, Fed policymakers interpret these shifts to be cyclical shocks but their ...
Working Paper Series , Paper 2000-16

Working Paper
Tax reform with useful public expenditures

This paper examines the economic effects of tax reform in an endogenous growth model that allows for two types of useful public expenditures; one type contributes to human capital information while the other provides direct utility to households. We show that the optimal fiscal policy calls for full expensing of private investment which shifts the tax base to private consumption. The efficient levels of public investment and public consumption relative to output are uniquely pinned down by parameters that govern both technology and preferences. In general, implementing the optimal fiscal ...
Working Papers in Applied Economic Theory , Paper 98-09

Journal Article
Projecting the Long-Run Natural Rate of Interest

The ?natural? rate of interest?the real rate consistent with full use of economic resources and steady inflation near the Fed?s target level?is an important benchmark for monetary policy. Current estimates suggest that this rate is near zero, but it is expected to rise gradually in the years ahead as real GDP returns to its long-run potential. If the historical statistical relationship between the growth rate of potential GDP and the natural rate holds true in the future, then a 2% long-run growth rate would imply a long-run natural rate of around 1%.
FRBSF Economic Letter

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