Andrea Colciago

Limited Asset Market Participation: Does it Really Matter for Monetary Policy?

We study the design of monetary policy in an economy characterized by staggered wage and price contracts together with limited asset market participation (LAMP). Contrary to previous results, we find that once nominal wage stickiness, an incontrovertible empirical fact, is considered: i) the Taylor Principle is restored as a necessary condition for equilibrium determinacy for any empirically plausible degree of LAMP; ii) the effect of LAMP for the design of optimal monetary policy are minor; iii) optimal interest rate rules become active no matter the degree of asset market participation. For this reasons we argue that LAMP does not matter much for monetary policy.

Endogenous Market Structures and Labour Market Dynamics

We propose a flexible prices model where endogenous market structures and search and matching frictions in the labour market interact endogenously. The interplay between firms’ endogenous entry, strategic interactions among producers and labour market frictions represents a strong amplification channel for technology shocks on labour market variables and helps in addressing the unemployment- volatility puzzle. Consistently with US evidence, new firms create a large fraction of new jobs and grow faster than more mature firms, net entry of firms is procyclical and the price mark-up is countercyclical.

Endogenous Market Structures and Optimal Taxation

This article provides optimal labour and dividend income taxation in a general equilibrium model with oligopolistic competition and endogenous firms’ entry. In the long run, the optimal dividend income tax corrects for inefficient entry. The dividend income tax depends on the form of competition and the nature of the sunk entry costs. In particular, it is higher in market structures characterised by competition in quantities rather than those characterised by price competition. Oligopolistic competition leads to an endogenous countercyclical price markup. As a result, offsetting the distortions over the business cycle requires deviations from full tax smoothing.

Firm Dynamics, Endogenous Markups, And The Labor Share Of Income

Recent U.S. evidence suggests that the response of labor share to a productivity shock is characterized by countercyclicality and overshooting. These findings cannot be reconciled easily with existing business cycle models. We extend the Diamond–Mortensen–Pissarides model of search in the labor market by considering strategic interactions among an endogenous number of producers, which leads to countercyclical price markups. Although Nash bargaining delivers a countercyclical labor share, we show that countercyclical markups are fundamental to address the overshooting. On the contrary, we find that real wage rigidity does not seem to play a crucial role in the dynamics of the labor share of income.

Firm Entry, Endogenous Markups and the Dynamics of the Labor Share of Income

Recent U.S. evidence suggests that the response of labor share to a productivity shock is characterized by countercyclicality and overshooting. These findings cannot be easily reconciled with existing business cycle models. We extend the Diamond-Mortensen-Pissarides model of search in the labor market by considering strategic interactions among an endogenous number of producers, which leads to countercyclical price markups. While Nash bargaining delivers a countercyclical labor share, we show that countercyclical markups are fundamental to address the overshooting. On the contrary, we find that real wage rigidity does not seem to play a crucial role for the dynamics of the labor share of income.

Technology Adoption, Job Matching Frictions and Business Creation

We study the impact of a General Purpose Technology that changes the cost structure turning fixed costs into variable ones in most sectors. A major recent example is cloud computing, whose adoption allows firms to avoid large up-front costs in IT and to rent computing capability online. We study the macroeconomic impact of the adoption of such an innovation in a DSGE model with endogenous market structures in the goods market and search and matching frictions in the labor market. To start a business, firms need to hire workers from the pool of unemployed agents and set up a stock of IT capital: the new technology allows them to rent computing capabilities reducing entry costs. Such an innovation can have a substantial impact on business and job creation.

Central Bank Policies and Income and Wealth Inequality: A Survey

This paper takes stock of the literature on the relationship between central bank policies and inequality. A new paradigm which integrates sticky-prices, incomplete markets and heterogeneity among households is emerging, which allows to jointly study how inequality shapes macroeconomic aggregates and how macroeconomic shocks and policies affect inequality. While the new paradigm features multiple distributional channels of monetary policy, most empirical analyses analyse each potential channel of redistribution in isolation. Our review suggests that empirical research on the effect of conventional monetary policy on income and wealth inequality yields very mixed findings, although there seems to be a consensus that higher inflation, at least above some threshold, increases inequality. In contrast to common wisdom, the conclusions concerning the impact of unconventional monetary policies on income inequality are also not clear cut. This is so since these policies may reduce income inequality by stimulating economic activity, but may also increase inequality by boosting asset prices. Similarly, results concerning the impact of unconventional monetary policies on wealth inequality are rather mixed. The scant literature on the impact of macro-prudential policies on inequality finds evidence for redistributive effects, but in view of its limitations it may be too early to come to conclusions.

Structural Reforms and Endogenous Market Structures

This chapter studies the effects of structural reforms on the labour share using a DSGE model, distinguishing between monopolistic and oligopolistic competition in the goods market. Two specific structural reforms are considered: a reduction in entry costs for new firms and a reduction in unemployment benefits. The impact on labour share of lower entry costs depends on the type of competition. Under oligopolistic competition the labour share of income increases in the long run, but under monopolistic competition it permanently decreases. A reduction in unemployment benefits results in a permanently lower (higher) labour (profit) share of income.

Determinacy Analysis in High Order Dynamic Systems: The Case of Nominal Rigidities and Limited Asset Market Participation

We show how to use Hurwitz polynomials to study the stability and uniqueness of Rational Expectation equilibria in Dynamic General Equilibrium models. We apply this method to a model characterized by staggered wage and price contracts and by limited asset market participation (LAMP). We prove analytically in a fourth-order dynamics system that, once nominal wage stickiness is taken into account, LAMP does not invalidate the Taylor Principle: for any plausible degree of asset market participation an active interest rate rule ensures the uniqueness of the rational expectation equilibrium.