How Does Macroeconomic Policy Affect Output?

macroeconomics, Macroeconomic Policy, Output

On the Interface Between Operations and Human Resources Management

Operations management (OM) and human resources management (HRM) have historically been very separate fields. In practice, operations managers and human resource managers interact primarily on administrative issues regarding payroll and other matters. In academia, the two subjects are studied by separate communities of scholars publishing in disjoint sets of journals, drawing on mostly separate disciplinary foundations. Yet, operations and human resources are intimately related at a fundamental level. Operations are the context that often explains or moderates the effects of human resource activities such as pay, training, communications and staffing. Human responses to operations management systems often explain variations or anomalies that would otherwise be treated as randomness or error variance in traditional operations research models. In this paper, we probe the interface between operations and human resources by examining how human considerations affect classical OM results and how operational considerations affect classical HRM results. We then propose a unifying framework for identifying new research opportunities at the intersection of the two fields

The monetarist controversy; or, should we forsake stabilization policies?

Economic stabilization ; Monetary theory

The Changing Cyclical Variability of Economic Activity in the United States

This paper examines the changing cyclical variability of economic activity in the United States. It first shows that the decline in variability since World War II cannot be explained by changes in the composition of economic activity or by the avoidance of financial panics. We then show that increased automatic stabilization by the government, and the increased availability of private credit after World War II combined to stabilize consumption and reduce the variability of aggregate demand. The main argument of the paper holds that greater price rigidity in recent times may have contributed to economic stability by preventing destabilizing deflations and inflations. Empirical evidence is presented to support this proposition.

Exchange Rate and Monetary Policy for Sustainable Post-conflict Transition

This paper asks the question as to whether the choice of the exchange rate regime matters for post-conflict economic recovery and macro stabilization. Though an important aspect of the macroeconomic agenda for post-conflict, it has however, been largely ignored by the literature. We identify three main exchange rate regimes (fixed, managed floating and free float) and estimate their marginal contributions to post-conflict economic recovery and macro stabilization in the context of fully specified models of four pivotal macroeconomic variables: per capita GDP and export growth, the demand for money balances and inflation. The paper estimates extended versions of these models in a panel over 1970-2008 covering 132 countries, including the 38 post-conflict countries and 94 peaceful ones as a control group. The evidence suggests that the managed floating regime appears to have an edge on some critical areas of economic performance for post-conflict reconstruction.Monetary policy, civil wars, transition, economic growth

Renminbising China's Foreign Assets

Since the 2008 global financial crisis, China has rolled out a number of initiatives to actively promote the international role of the renminbi and to denominate more of its international claims away from the US dollar and into the renminbi. This paper discusses the factors shaping the prospects of internationalising the renminbi from the perspective of the currency composition of China’s international assets and liabilities. These factors include, among others, underlying valuation and management of the renminbi.renminbi internationalisation, net international asset position, convertibility, exchange rate uncertainty, dollar peg