Alina Barnett

Learning by Disinflating

Disinflationary episodes are a valuable source of information for economic agents trying to learn about the economy. In this paper we are particularly interested in how policymakers can themselves learn by disinflating. The approach differs from the existing literature, which typically focuses on the learning of private agents during a disinflation. We build a model where both the policymaker and private agents learn, and ask what happens if the policymaker has to disinflate to satisfy a new central bank mandate specifying greater emphasis on inflation stabilisation. In this case, our results show that inflation may fall dramatically before it gradually rises to its new long run level. The potential for inflation to undershoot its long run level during a disinflationary episode suggests that caution should be exercised when assessing the success of any change in the policymakers mandate. JEL classification: D83, E52, E58 Keywords: Disinflation, Escape Dynamics, Learning, Monetary Policy

The Productivity Puzzle: A Firm-Level Investigation into Employment Behaviour and Resource Allocation Over the Crisis

Labour productivity in the United Kingdom has been exceptionally weak since the 2007/08 financial crisis. This paper uses firm-level data from the Office for National Statistics Annual Business Survey and the Inter-Departmental Business Register to better understand the nature of this weakness. Overall, our findings are consistent with existing literature which finds that within-firm productivity growth tends to be procyclical and emphasises the importance of the reallocation of resources between firms and sectors for productivity growth. More specifically, we find that up until 2011 there was a doubling in the proportion of firms with shrinking output and flat employment. This suggests that firms were able to respond flexibly to weak demand conditions by retaining staff at the expense of measured productivity, suggestive of an opening up of spare capacity within firms. However, the strength of recent hiring behaviour since 2012 means that this is now likely to be less of a factor. The lack of labour shedding, together with a low firm exit rate, is also indicative of low levels of resource reallocation between firms and sectors. To assess the importance of this to aggregate productivity growth we apply the method used by Baily, Bartelsman and Haltiwanger. We find that reallocation between firms (in terms of both the movement of labour and firm entry and exit) contributed significantly to aggregate productivity growth before the crisis, but its contribution fell substantially after. In fact, around one third of the productivity slowdown after 2007 can be attributed to slower reallocation of resources. The extent to which reduced factor reallocation, and so the weakness in productivity growth, persists remains a key question for the economic outlook.

Forecasting UK GDP Growth, Inflation and Interest Rates under Structural Change: A Comparison of Models with Time-Varying Parameters

Evidence from a large and growing empirical literature strongly suggests that there have been changes in inflation and output dynamics in the United Kingdom. This is largely based on a class of econometric models that allow for time-variation in coefficients and volatilities of shocks. While these have been used extensively to study evolving dynamics and for structural analysis, there is little evidence on their usefulness in forecasting UK output growth, inflation and the short-term interest rate. This paper attempts to fill this gap by comparing the performance of a wide variety of time-varying parameter models in forecasting output growth, inflation and a short rate. We find that allowing for time-varying parameters can lead to large and statistically significant gains in forecast accuracy.

Impaired Capital Reallocation and Productivity

The level of private sector labour productivity has been particularly weak since the start of the crisis. In this paper we explore whether impairment to capital reallocation has been contributing to this weakness. The recent increase in the dispersion of output, prices and rates of return across firms and sectors is stark, and suggests that resources have had incentives to move. Efficient allocation requires that capital moves to firms and sectors where rates of return are relatively high. And the change in capital levels across sectors has been particularly low, suggesting there has been an unusually slow process of capital reallocation since 2008 compared to previous UK recessions and other banking crises. This result is also apparent within sectors. We use a simple and general model to show that increased price dispersion can be a consequence of frictions to efficient capital allocation. And the size of this dispersion can usefully inform us about the size of the associated output and productivity loss. We then find that – using firm level data – the relationship between rates of return and subsequent capital movements has changed since the financial crisis. Overall, our results suggest that impaired capital reallocation across the UK economy is likely to have been one factor contributing to the recent weakness in productivity growth.

Has Weak Lending and Activity in the United Kingdom Been Driven by Credit Supply Shocks

This paper investigates the role of credit demand and supply shocks in driving the weakness in UK banks’ lending and economic activity during both the recent financial crisis and the various UK financial crises since 1966. It uses a structural vector autoregression analysis to identify separate credit demand and supply shocks in addition to the standard macroeconomic shocks that are typically analysed in this framework. It finds that credit supply shocks can account for most of the weakness in bank lending since the onset of the crisis and between a third and a half of the fall in GDP relative to its historic trend. It also finds that credit supply shocks appear to behave more like aggregate supply shocks than aggregate demand shocks because they cause output and inflation to move in opposite directions. This may be because credit supply shocks affect potential supply in the economy or because they have a significant exchange rate effect. The results appear robust to different identifying assumptions. The main sensitivity appears to be when spreads are treated as a non-stationary variable and long-run restrictions are placed on the model.

Time-Varying Inflation Expectations and Economic Fluctuations in the United Kingdom: A Structural VAR Analysis

This paper examines how the interaction between inflation expectations and nominal and real macroeconomic variables has evolved for the United Kingdom over the post-WWII period until 2007. We model time-variation through a Markov-switching structural vector autoregressive framework with variants of the sign restriction identification scheme to back out the time-varying effect of different structural shocks. We investigate the following questions: (i) How has the impact of the mix of real and nominal shocks on the UK economy evolved over time and did this have a specific impact on UK inflation expectations? and (ii) Has there been an autonomous impact of inflation expectations on the UK economy and has it changed over time? Our results suggest that shocks to inflation expectations had important effects on actual inflation in the 1970s, but this impact had significantly declined towards the end of our sample. This seems to be mainly due to a relatively slower response of monetary policy to these shocks in the 1970s compared to later years. Similarly, oil price shocks and real demand shocks led to important changes in macroeconomic variables in the 1970s. Beyond that period and up to the end of our sample oil price shocks became less significant for the dynamics of actual inflation and output growth. However real demand shocks became a relatively more important determinant for fluctuations in those series during the 1990s and the beginning of the 2000s. The changing response of monetary policy to this type of shock appears to be crucial for this result.

Has Weak Lending and Activity in the UK been Driven by Credit Supply Shocks

This paper investigates the role of credit supply shocks in driving the weakness in UK banks’ lending and economic activity during the various UK financial crises since 1966. It uses a structural VAR analysis to identify credit supply shocks separately from standard macroeconomic shocks. It finds that credit supply shocks can account for most of the weakness in bank lending since the onset of the recent financial crisis and 1/3 – 1/2 of the fall in GDP relative to its historic trend. It also finds that credit supply shocks behave more like aggregate supply shocks than aggregate demand shocks.