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DIW Roundup 110 / 2017
In many advanced economies, there has been a declining trend in interest rates over the past thirty years. Since the financial crisis, interest rates have remained particularly low. Though a decrease in inflation explains part of the fall in nominal interest rates, there is also a clear downtrend in real interest rates. Against this backdrop, a debate has emerged over the factors that might have contributed ...
2017| Guido Baldi, Patrick Harms
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DIW Roundup 109 / 2017
The concept of the natural rate of interest (NRI) dates back to Wicksell (1898) and has since then been highly debated in the economic literature. In practice, estimates of the NRI can be employed as a versatile tool for macroeconomic analysis and are a core element within the popular neo-Wicksellian (or New-Keynesian) framework. The real rate gap, i.e. the difference between the actual interest rate ...
2017| Dmitry Chervyakov, Philipp König
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DIW Roundup 108 / 2017
The term natural (or neutral) real interest rate refers to the equilibrium value of the real interest rate. As this equilibrium is usually conceived as a situation where inflationary or deflationary pressures have abated, the natural real interest rate is a key concept for central banks seeking to stabilize the general price level or targeting the rate of inflation. The present roundup provides a brief ...
2017| Philipp König, Dmitry Chervyakov
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DIW Roundup 107 / 2017
Inflation targeting has become one of the most prominent monetary regimes around the globe. Proponents argue that it reduces the dynamic inconsistency problem of monetary policy and thereby stabilises prices, which in turn promotes growth. Opponents, on the other hand, say that by focusing on price stability inflation targeting neglects other important policy objectives, such as financial stability, ...
2017| Malte Rieth
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DIW Roundup 99 / 2016
The academic literature provides no clear answer to this question. In principle, the recent slowdown in reform activity and fiscal consolidation in the euro area may derive from several developments. Potential reasons involve the end of the economic recession, the provision of financial assistance to crisis countries, and improved financing conditions for governments as a result of unconventional monetary ...
2016| Malte Rieth, Lisa Gehrt
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DIW Roundup 97 / 2016
Unter Sovereign Wealth Funds (SWF) oder Staatsfonds werden Fonds verstanden, die im Auftrag eines Staates Geld anlegen und verwalten. Die Fonds speisen sich häufig aus Ressourcen, insbesondere aus Einnahmen von Öl- und Gasexporten. Sie sollen in rohstoffexportierenden Ländern dazu beitragen, mögliche Preisschwankungen auf internationalen Rohstoffmärkten abzufedern oder finanzielle Reserven für künftige ...
2016| Hella Engerer
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DIW Roundup 95 / 2016
One of the central results in international economics is that an economy cannot have at the same time independent monetary policy, free capital flows, and a fixed exchange rate. Over the last few years, however, this so-called Mundell-Flemming ‘trilemma’ has increasingly been challenged. It is argued that given the rising importance and synchronization of capital and credit flows across countries and ...
2016| Pablo Anaya, Michael Hachula
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DIW Roundup 93 / 2016
A key challenge for economic policy today is to make the financial system more resilient. The literature finds that high indebtedness (or: leverage), both in the financial and in the real sectors, is a danger to macroeconomic stability and growth. Moreover, the design of the corporate tax system is an important determinant of leverage: in many countries interest paid on debt is tax-deductible while ...
2016| Franziska Bremus, Jeremias Huber
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DIW Roundup 88 / 2015
Despite expansionary central bank action, inflation remains low in the euro area. How much can we expect from the additional stimulus in face of anaemic global growth and declining oil prices? More generally, have central banks lost the ability to steer inflation in a globalised world where external factors have powerful effects on domestic inflation? This roundup summarises the evidence in the literature ...
2015| Malte Rieth
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DIW Roundup 83 / 2015
In many advanced economies, the economic recovery from the financial crisis has been sluggish. In light of these developments, it has been argued by various economists that economic growth per capita has already been on a downward trend since the 1980s. Studies suggest that this is largely due to low productivity growth. While factors of production such as labor and capital are being used more productively ...
2015| Guido Baldi, Patrick Harms