December 22, 2014
Neil Irwin had an interesting piece in the Upshot section of the NYT on the origins of 2.0 percent as an inflation target for central banks. He concludes the piece by arguing that, while the target may be too low, it would be very difficult to move away from it.
There are a few issues worth noting on this point. First, the 2 percent target has not been precisely defined in most countries. In the United States, Fed chairs have been quick to note that it is an average, not a ceiling. This means that they could easily run an inflation rate above 2.0 percent for a number of years without violating their rule. If we had inflation about 2.0 percent for 4-5 years, and then the Fed announced that the recent inflation rate was in fact the target rate, it is not obvious that this would cause any great harm. The question would be whether people’s expectations are based more on the target than on the inflation rates they have actually been seeing in the world.
This raises a second point, central banks, including the Fed, have been consistently undershooting their target since the start of the recession. If their credibility depends on hitting the target, then they should have lost a great deal of credibility in the last 7 years. Polls on expectations also seem to indicate that most people’s expectations are based more on recent inflation rates than on targets.
A third point is that while targeting may be useful for bringing down inflation, inflation rates fell throughout the world in both countries that targeted inflation and those that didn’t. If targeting can bring down inflation at a lower cost in terms of unemployment, then it would be a positive, but if it also prevents central banks from actions to boost the economy out of a downturn, then the loss can be far more than offsetting.
Finally, the piece ends with a discussion of central bank credibility, quoting Princeton economist and former Fed Vice-Chair Alan Blinder:
“Central bankers have invested a lot and established a great deal of credibility on their 2 percent inflation target, and I think they’re right to be very hesitant to give it up. If you change from 2 percent to 3 percent, how does the market know you won’t change 3 to 4?”
It is entirely possible that central bankers would find it too embarrassing to reverse course and adopt a policy that is better for the economy and the country. (Jean-Claude Trichet, the first head of the European Central Bank, patted himself on the back when he retired from the bank in 2011 even though the euro zone was still in the midst of a potentially fatal financial crisis. He pointed out that they had kept inflation below its 2.0 percent target.) In this case, it would be essential that elected leaders dictate to the central bankers that they have to swallow their pride and give up some of their hard-earned credibility.
As tens of millions of unemployed workers say, you can’t eat central bank credibility.
Addendum:
It is also worth noting that we had very rapid growth throughout the OECD countries in the 1950s and 1960s in spite of the lack of inflation targets and uneven rates of inflation throughout this period. It is possible that growth would have been even more rapid if the inflation rate had been more stable, but clearly erratic movements in the inflation rate did not preclude rapid economic growth.
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