TY - JOUR
T1 - Innocent Bystanders? Monetary policy and inequality
AU - Coibion, Olivier
AU - Gorodnichenko, Yuriy
AU - Kueng, Lorenz
AU - Silvia, John
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2017 Elsevier B.V.
PY - 2017/6
Y1 - 2017/6
N2 - We study the effects of monetary policy shocks on—and their historical contribution to—consumption and income inequality in the United States since 1980 as measured by the Consumer Expenditure Survey. Contractionary monetary policy systematically increases inequality in labor earnings, total income, consumption and total expenditures. Furthermore, monetary policy shocks account for a non-trivial component of the historical cyclical variation in income and consumption inequality. Using detailed micro-level data on income and consumption, we document some of the different channels via which monetary policy shocks affect inequality, as well as how these channels depend on the nature of the change in monetary policy.
AB - We study the effects of monetary policy shocks on—and their historical contribution to—consumption and income inequality in the United States since 1980 as measured by the Consumer Expenditure Survey. Contractionary monetary policy systematically increases inequality in labor earnings, total income, consumption and total expenditures. Furthermore, monetary policy shocks account for a non-trivial component of the historical cyclical variation in income and consumption inequality. Using detailed micro-level data on income and consumption, we document some of the different channels via which monetary policy shocks affect inequality, as well as how these channels depend on the nature of the change in monetary policy.
KW - Consumption inequality
KW - Income inequality
KW - Monetary policy
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85019654971&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=85019654971&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.jmoneco.2017.05.005
DO - 10.1016/j.jmoneco.2017.05.005
M3 - Comment/debate
AN - SCOPUS:85019654971
SN - 0304-3932
VL - 88
SP - 70
EP - 89
JO - Carnegie-Rochester Confer. Series on Public Policy
JF - Carnegie-Rochester Confer. Series on Public Policy
ER -
