"Gesell Tax" and Efficiency of Monetary Exchange

Abstract

A periodic "Gesell Tax" on money holdings as a way to overcome the zero-lower-bound on nominal interest rates is studied in a framework where money is essential. For this purpose, I characterize the efficiency properties of taxing money in a full-fledged macroeconomic business cycle model of the third-generation of monetary search models. Both, inflation and "Gesell taxes" maximize steady state capital stock, output, consumption, investment and welfare at moderate levels. The Friedman rule is sub-optimal, unless accompanied by a moderate “Gesell tax”. In a recession scenario a Gesell tax speeds up the recovery in a similar way as a large fiscal stimulus but avoids "crowding out" of private consumption and investment.monetary search-theory, negative interest rates, Gesell tax, capital formation, DSGE model