Nominal Rigidity, Monetary Policy and Expectation Driven Business Cycles

Abstract In this paper, I explore the effects nominal rigidities and monetary policies have on the generation of Pigou cycles, that is, business cycles driven by agents’ expectations of future technology. The optimal response of the central bank is analyzed under circumstances when agents receive a signal indicating the technology change in the future. To achieve these objectives, I introduce nominal rigidities and monetary policy into a standard two-sector model with non-durable and durable goods. The optimal reaction of the central bank is found by solving the Ramsey optimization problem. Furthermore, the Ramsey optimal policy can be approximated by simple operational policy rules. I find that nominal rigidities tend to amplify the responses to the expectation and monetary policies affect the expectation driven business cycles by affecting the real interest rate and user cost of durable goods. Another interesting result is that a simple policy rule reacting to the inflation rates in both non-durable and durable sector with appropriate weights can closely mimic the performance of the Ramsey policy.