Aggregate disturbances, monetary policy, and the macroeconomy: the FRB/US perspective

The FRB/US macroeconometric model of the U.S. economy was created at the Federal Reserve Board for use in policy analysis and forecasting. This article begins with an examination of the model's characterization of the monetary transmission mechanism -- the chain of relationships describing how monetary policy actions influence financial markets and, in turn, output and inflation. The quantitative nature of this mechanism is illustrated by estimates of the effect of movements in interest rates and other factors on spending in different sectors and by simulations of the effect of a change in the stance of policy on the economy as a whole. After the discussion of the transmission mechanism, the article considers the influence of monetary policy on the macroeconomic consequences of specific events by showing how the predicted effects of selected disturbances change under alternative policy responses. These examples illustrate an important policy tradeoff in the FRB/US model involving the variability (but not the level) of output and inflation: Past some point, lower variability in inflation can be obtained only at the expense of greater fluctuations in output and interest rates.Forecasting ; Macroeconomics ; Monetary policy

An investigation into tacit knowledge management at the supervisory level.

An investigation into tacit knowledge management at the supervisory level Objective: The purpose of this study was to investigate how supervisors managed tacit knowledge. Aims: The aims were to understand what tacit knowledge looked like on the shop floor, to understand "experience‟ in terms of tacit knowledge, and to describe the methods and techniques that supervisors used to manage this elusive resource as they went about the task of achieving organisational goals. Method: Qualitative data was collected using a novel iterative participant observation method, where the researcher-as-instrument was embedded as a novice (but privileged) employee for extended periods in four different case study sites. Over the course of the study, the researcher took on the role of laboratory technician, electrical engineer, manufacturing process worker, and aircraft maintenance engineer. A grounded theory approach was taken to the analysis of the various field notes, photographs, video, audio, and found objects. The methodology was augmented with specialist qualitative research software to manage the data. Results: It was found that supervisors' tacit knowledge management activities can be classified according to formal and informal behaviours that correspond with Nonaka and Takeuchi's SECI knowledge life cycle. It was also found that a worker's task related tacit knowledge has seven aspects in five levels of competency, and their experience can be described in terms of 10 categories of tacit knowledge working capital. Insights attributed to the novel method of data collection produced an unexpected finding – the Home Guard model, which describes how the value of an individual's knowledge sharing activities is related to their power distance and self-confidence. Conclusions: The findings provide empirical support for existing knowledge management theory, identify specific supervisory behaviours that support tacit knowledge management on the shop floor, and extend the knowledge management discourse with new theories about knowledge sharing behaviours that have direct application to the supervisory role

Preventing driving under the influence through informal interventions: An examination of the decision making processes common to potential DUI offenders

One novel approach to the driving under the influence (DUI) problem is the informal DUI intervention. Informal DUI interventions are any attempts made to prevent an alcohol-impaired individual from driving. The research to date has concentrated on the factors leading individuals to intervene, informally, in a DUI situation. Comparatively little research has investigated the factors leading potential drunk drivers to comply with informal intervention requests. An interactional arousal/cost-benefit model was used to predict self-reported informal DUI intervention compliance. According to the model, potential DUI offenders\u27 decisions to comply with intervention requests would be influenced by background variables, context variables, intervention type variables, and evaluative and subjective response variables. Experiment 1 consisted of a survey containing measures to assess the reliability and validity of the measures included in the survey. The survey materials were found to provide adequate measures of the constructs under investigation. A second, independent experiment was conducted on a sample of 453 undergraduate students. Forty-four percent of the sample (males = 97; females = 105) reported that another individual had attempted to stop them from driving following drinking in the past year. A hierarchical regression analysis was conducted on these 202 individuals. Background variables, context variables, intervention type variables, and evaluative and subjective response variables were entered in four sequential blocks. The first block of background variables failed to contribute significantly to the prediction of self-reported compliance. The second block composed of context variables also failed to predict self-reported compliance. The third block of intervention specific-variables explained a significant amount of the variance (r2 = .89) attributable to self-reported compliance. The fourth and final block of evaluative and subjective response variables failed to increase significantly the amount of variance explained by the final regression equation. Results imply that decisions to comply with informal DUI interventions are guided by a heuristic model (which is mainly a function of the number of passive and assertive interventions attempted) rather than the arousal/cost-benefit model that has been found to underlie the intervener\u27s decision

Have we underestimated the likelihood and severity of zero lower bound events?

Before the recent recession, the consensus among researchers was that the zero lower bound (ZLB) probably would not pose a significant problem for monetary policy as long as a central bank aimed for an inflation rate of about 2 percent; some have even argued that an appreciably lower target inflation rate would pose no problems. This paper reexamines this consensus in the wake of the financial crisis, which has seen policy rates at their effective lower bound for more than two years in the United States and Japan and near zero in many other countries. We conduct our analysis using a set of structural and time series statistical models. We find that the decline in economic activity and interest rates in the United States has generally been well outside forecast confidence bands of many empirical macroeconomic models. In contrast, the decline in inflation has been less surprising. We identify a number of factors that help to account for the degree to which models were surprised by recent events. First, uncertainty about model parameters and latent variables, which were typically ignored in past research, significantly increases the probability of hitting the ZLB. Second, models that are based primarily on the Great Moderation period severely understate the incidence and severity of ZLB events. Third, the propagation mechanisms and shocks embedded in standard DSGE models appear to be insufficient to generate sustained periods of policy being stuck at the ZLB, such as we now observe. We conclude that past estimates of the incidence and effects of the ZLB were too low and suggest a need for a general reexamination of the empirical adequacy of standard models. In addition to this statistical analysis, we show that the ZLB probably had a first-order impact on macroeconomic outcomes in the United States. Finally, we analyze the use of asset purchases as an alternative monetary policy tool when short-term interest rates are constrained by the ZLB, and find that the Federal Reserve's asset purchases have been effective at mitigating the economic costs of the ZLB. In particular, model simulations indicate that the past and projected expansion of the Federal Reserve's securities holdings since late 2008 will lower the unemployment rate, relative to what it would have been absent the purchases, by 1-1/2 percentage points by 2012. In addition, we find that the asset purchases have probably prevented the U.S. economy from falling into deflation.Inflation (Finance) ; Interest rates ; Macroeconomics - Econometric models

A comparative study of breast surface reconstruction for aesthetic outcome assessment

Breast cancer is the most prevalent cancer type in women, and while its survival rate is generally high the aesthetic outcome is an increasingly important factor when evaluating different treatment alternatives. 3D scanning and reconstruction techniques offer a flexible tool for building detailed and accurate 3D breast models that can be used both pre-operatively for surgical planning and post-operatively for aesthetic evaluation. This paper aims at comparing the accuracy of low-cost 3D scanning technologies with the significantly more expensive state-of-the-art 3D commercial scanners in the context of breast 3D reconstruction. We present results from 28 synthetic and clinical RGBD sequences, including 12 unique patients and an anthropomorphic phantom demonstrating the applicability of low-cost RGBD sensors to real clinical cases. Body deformation and homogeneous skin texture pose challenges to the studied reconstruction systems. Although these should be addressed appropriately if higher model quality is warranted, we observe that low-cost sensors are able to obtain valuable reconstructions comparable to the state-of-the-art within an error margin of 3 mm.Comment: This paper has been accepted to MICCAI201

The role of expectations in the FRB/US macroeconomic model

In the past year, the staff of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System began using a new macroeconomic model of the U.S. economy referred to as the FRB/US model. This system of mathematical equations, describing interactions among economic measures such as inflation, interest rates, and gross domestic product, is one of the tools used in economic forecasting and the analysis of macroeconomic policy issues at the Board. The FRB/US model replaces the MPS model, which, with periodic revisions, had been used at the Federal Reserve Board since the early 1970s. A key feature of the new model is that expectations of future economic conditions are explicit in many of its equations. Because of this clear delineation of expectations, the FRB/US model can be used to study issues that would be difficult or impossible to study with the MPS model. For example, the new model can show how the economy's response to specific events, such as a reduction in defense spending, may vary considerably with the speed at which the public recognizes that the event has occurred or will occur.Econometric models ; Federal Reserve System ; Forecasting

Hinode EUV Imaging Spectrometer Observations of Solar Active Region Dynamics

The EUV Imaging Spectrometer (EIS) on the Hinode satellite is capable of measuring emission line center positions for Gaussian line profiles to a fraction of a spectral pixel, resulting in relative solar Doppler-shift measurements with an accuracy of less than a km/s for strong lines. We show an example of the application of that capability to an active region sit-and-stare observation in which the EIS slit is placed at one location on the Sun and many exposures are taken while the spacecraft tracking keeps the same solar location within the slit. For the active region examined (NOAA 10930), we find that significant intensity and Doppler-shift fluctuations as a function of time are present at a number of locations. These fluctuations appear to be similar to those observed in high-temperature emission lines with other space-borne spectroscopic instruments. With its increased sensitivity over earlier spectrometers and its ability to image many emission lines simultaneously, EIS should provide significant new constraints on Doppler-shift oscillations in the corona.Comment: 7 Pages, 7 figure

Democracy, Citizenship and Legitimacy: A Citizenship Mini-Conference

The University Archives has determined that this item is of continuing value to OSU's history.Ohio State University. Mershon Center for International Security StudiesEvent webpag