Policymaker Roundtable Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas Conference : " John Taylor ' s Contributions to Monetary

I would like to add my voice to the chorus in thanking President Fisher and the Dallas Fed for hosting this conference honoring John Taylor. It is a particular pleasure to have been invited to join this distinguished panel and to have this opportunity to discuss some of John Taylor's many important contributions to economics and monetary policy. In looking back at his work, I am struck by how thoroughly his research has affected the way policymakers and economists analyze the economy and approach monetary policy. His influence and, indeed, his name is heard whenever people talk about monetary policy, whether it's the Taylor Curve, the Taylor Principle, or, of course, the Taylor Rule. I'm told that an unwary indexer once even credited him with the Taylor expansion that we all learned in our calculus classes—something that surely made Brook Taylor spin in his grave. I'll focus my comments today on the aspects of John Taylor's research that have shaped the discussion of monetary policy issues at the Federal Reserve and at central banks around the world. In so doing, I admit to giving short shrift to John's many other contributions, but I have only so much time! I have divided John's contributions to monetary policy into three branches: analyzing nominal rigidities, modeling the global economy, and developing principles of monetary policy.