Understanding whether labor market developments stem from supply or demand forces has fundamental implications for the conduct of monetary policy. This article develops a structural vector autoregression (VAR) methodology to decompose U.S. employment and wage growth into supply and demand components using sign restrictions. Extending Shapiro 2026, we separately identify trend growth, current shocks, and past shocks across different industries. Results reveal that goods-producing sectors experienced strong demand-driven growth in 2022, which subsequently weakened as Federal Reserve tightening took effect. Service sectors showed robust demand through 2023, but by 2025, supply-side factors-likely due to immigration policy changes-became dominant. We validate our shock identification by linking estimated demand shocks to financial dependence measures during monetary tightening and supply shocks to immigration flows. These findings highlight the asymmetric nature of post-pandemic labor market rebalancing and underscore the importance of distinguishing supply from demand forces for appropriate monetary policy calibration.
Following the literature that uses data from the Consumer Expenditure Survey and the consumer price index, this article examines U.S. households' inflation experiences during the recent period from 2010 to 2023. We construct group-specific market baskets to reflect diverse spending patterns and identify key differences in inflation. Our main finding is that, although average inflation was higher and more volatile during this period, inflation inequality remained stable or even declined compared with the earlier period. Nevertheless, despite the overall similarity in households' inflation experiences, the underlying drivers of inflation-by consumption category and specific subcategory-can differ significantly.
The U.S. did not experience large decreases in production or employment during the disinflation of 2022-2024. To put this unusually costless disinflation in context, this article characterizes the behavior of economic variables from more than 100 disinflation episodes in OECD countries. We decompose these episodes into those that successfully reduced inflation over several years, those in which inflation substantially rebounded, and the most recent episodes of 2022-2024. Successful episodes show several differences in comparison to failed episodes, including lower real interest rates and higher stock prices. The recent disinflations of 2022-2024 sometimes resemble successful episodes, but with essentially no average output loss. By characterizing the behavior of recent episodes, as well as historical disinflations with differing outcomes, we create a set of stylized facts to guide analysis of disinflation policies.
We develop a simple model where the final output is produced using two technologies-one with diminishing returns and another with constant returns-and labor as the sole input. We show that the rate of decline in the share of agricultural employment is a sufficient statistic for the onset of economic transition from stagnation to sustained growth. Our quantitative results are consistent with the implications for the evolution of per capita income for economies in various stages of development and structural transformation.
This article presents a framework to monitor differences in real expenditure growth and inflation in real time, focusing on variations across the expenditure distribution. High-frequency tracking of heterogeneity in real expenditure growth and inflation holds particular value for policymakers. The newly constructed time series reveals three key findings. First, households with lower expenditure levels have faced higher inflation since 2000 than those with higher expenditure levels, with significant disparities in the range of 0.57 and 1.23 percentage-point differences between 2005-2008 and 2011, respectively. Second, volatility in real expenditure growth is higher for lower-expenditure households than for higher-expenditure ones. Third, there was significant heterogeneity in the recovery of real expenditure in the two years following the outbreak of COVID-19.
This article examines the distributional effects of government bailouts using a heterogeneous agent New Keynesian model with financial intermediation frictions. We analyze government equity injections to financial institutions financed by debt issuance, capturing essential features of bailout policies during financial crises. When calibrated to match key features of the U.S. economy, bailout policies are expansionary and reduce inequality through general equilibrium effects operating primarily via aggregate demand stimulation and increased labor income rather than direct wealth effects. Equity injections increase the financial sector's capacity to intermediate capital, leading to higher capital prices, increased investment, and substantial aggregate demand increases. This improves labor market conditions that benefit lower-income households more than wealth effects benefit the wealthy. The result is reduced wealth and consumption inequality, demonstrating that bailouts can simultaneously achieve macroeconomic stabilization and inequality reduction.
We propose a new methodology to discover emerging corporate risks in real time by analyzing the text of quarterly earnings conference calls from 2008 to 2025. Our approach identifies bigrams (two-word phrases) within risk-related sentences whose usage surges significantly and then groups them into thematic topics. The method successfully recovers a timeline of major economic events, from the credit crisis in 2008 to macroeconomic and tariff uncertainty in 2025. We find that firms manage these risks differently. While macroeconomic uncertainty is associated with reductions in investment and employment, a rise in trade uncertainty is associated with capital expenditures and hiring. These expansions, however, are also associated with higher inflation: Higher trade uncertainty is, on average, followed by significant increases in producer prices. Our findings demonstrate that not all uncertainty is alike and suggest that the recent rise of macroeconomic and trade uncertainty together poses a stagflationary risk.
This article analyzes market-based probability distributions for long-run inflation expectations derived from inflation derivatives. We construct forward-looking distributions for five-year-ahead inflation to assess the likelihood that inflation will fall above, below, or near the Federal Reserve's 2 percent target. By examining the mean, volatility, and skewness of these distributions, we document how expectations have evolved since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. To assess the reliability of market-based measures, we compare our results with alternative data sources. We highlight the elevated probability of inflation exceeding the 2 percent target that persisted shortly after the COVID-19 pandemic. The findings underscore the importance of market-based tools in capturing nuanced inflation dynamics and informing policy and financial decisions.
The Federal Reserve currently implements its interest rate policy under a framework known as the floor s ystem. In order for the floor system to operate smoothly, there must be sufficient liquidity in the federal funds market. The ongoing goal of quantitative tightening (QT) is to reach the minimal level of market liquidity required to implement monetary policy efficiently and effectively, also known as an ample reserves regime. We briefly discuss changes in the monetary policy framework from the previous corridor system to today's floor system as well as the circumstances that brought them about. Finally, this article complements the literature by proposing that liquidity changes in the composition of bank deposits since the COVID-19 pandemic, paired with modifications in savings account regulation, play an important role in increasing the demand for bank reserves, thus raising the threshold for what may be considered ample. A simple econometric analysis confirms our conjecture. Therefore, the composition of bank deposits should be considered when performing QT policy.
Recent geopolitical tensions have revived interest in understanding the economic consequences of geopolitical fragmentation. Using bilateral trade flows, portfolio investment data, and detailed records of economic policy interventions, we revisit widely-used geopolitical distance metrics, specifically the Ideal Point Distance (IPD) derived from United Nations General Assembly voting. We document substantial variability in measured fragmentation, driven significantly by methodological choices related to sample periods and vote categories, especially in the wake of Russiaâs 2022 invasion of Ukraine. Our results show robust evidence of increasing fragmentation in both trade flows and economic policy interventions among geopolitically distant country pairs, with particularly strong effects observed in strategically important sectors and policy motives. In contrast, financial portfolio allocations exhibit weaker, more heterogeneous, and context-sensitive responses. These findings highlight the critical importance of methodological transparency and careful specification when assessing geopolitical realignments and their implications for international economic relations.
The 1994-95 tightening episode was one of the most notable in the FOMC’s history because the FOMC raised the policy rate by 300 basis points in a year, despite headline and core CPI inflation trending lower prior to the beginning of tighter policy in February 1994. Although Chair Alan Greenspan publicly signaled the FOMC’s desire to normalize its policy rate prior to February 1994, the Federal Reserve’s actions nonetheless caught the Treasury market by surprise, triggering a sharp decline in long-term bond prices. Chair Greenspan and the FOMC were regularly surprised that inflation was not rising by more than the forecasts suggested during the episode. This article presents some evidence that the Greenbook forecast systematically, albeit modestly, overpredicted CPI inflation during the tightening period. Still, the success of the episode stemmed importantly from the decision by Greenspan and the FOMC to increase the policy rate to a level deemed restrictive for most of 1995. The end result was the avoidance of a recession and an eventual slowing in inflation and inflation expectations.
This article documents heterogeneity in work from home (WFH) using six nationally representative U.S. surveys. These surveys show consistent patterns indicating that pre-pandemic differences in WFH rates by sex, education, and state of residence expanded following the COVID-19 outbreak. The surveys also show similar post-pandemic trends in WFH by firm size and industry. We find that an industry's WFH potential was highly correlated with actual WFH during the first year or two of the COVID-19 pandemic. However, this correlation was much weaker before and after, suggesting that WFH potential is a necessary but not sufficient determinant of actual WFH.
We investigate the impact of digital technology on employment patterns in Korea, where firms have rapidly adopted digital technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI), big data, and cloud computing. By exploiting regional variations in technology exposure, we find significant negative effects on female workers, particularly those in non-IT (information technology) services. This contrasts with previous technological disruptions, such as the IT revolution and robotization, which primarily affected male workers in manufacturing. The negative employment effect of AI did not differ across educational groups, but big data and cloud computing more negatively affected workers with less education. In IT services, although employment shares of professionals and technicians declined, vacancy postings for these positions increased, implying a shift in labor demand toward newer skill sets within the same occupations. These findings highlight both the labor displacement and the new opportunities generated by digital transformation.
This article studies the factors that led former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker to stop and then reverse course in the most famous monetary tightening cycle in U.S. history. I explain how the Fed began cutting its policy rate target, thus ending the tightening cycle, in July of 1982. Although the Fed had gained some ground in its fight against inflation, in mid-1982, inflation was running above 7 percent, well above the 2 percent inflation rate that the U.S. enjoyed before the Great Inflation. Beyond the Federal Open Market Committee’s (FOMC) partial success at taming inflation, I describe how economic pain and financial market stress were two practical and related considerations in the summer of 1982 that likely contributed to the monetary policy pivot. Finally, I discuss the political pressure facing the FOMC at that time.
We examined statements made by Federal Reserve leadership since the early 1950s and established there has been considerable continuity in policymakers’ perceptions of the benefits of price stability. Policymakers have consistently contended that deviations from price stability give rise to greater cyclical instability, and they have also frequently suggested that potential output is significantly lowered by inflation. The recurrent support for price stability that comes through in these statements implies that it is invalid to interpret deviations from price stability in the U.S. economy as an indication that policymakers seek inflation.
This article examines the likely economic effects of a Chinese invasion or blockade of Taiwan for the U.S. and the world by considering historical precedents. Such a conflict would likely produce a flight-to-safety in the asset market, huge disruptions in international trade, and banking problems, and it would greatly exacerbate existing fiscal pressures. The authorities of the People's Republic of China would probably try to sell U.S. and other western securities prior to a conflict to avoid sanctions on those assets. Such sales would be temporarily disruptive but would likely have only marginal effects on yields in the longer term. Long-term effects would include disrupted trade, higher price levels, higher levels of nominal debt, and higher taxes.
The Federal Reserve Act was the outcome of compromises among competing economic and political interests. Numerous studies examine how the act came together but largely take the makeup of Congress and the administration as given rather than considering the unique circumstances that led to that political distribution. This article examines how the election of 1912 changed the makeup of Congress, which increased the likelihood of central banking legislation and shaped the act. The decision of Theodore Roosevelt and other progressives to run as third-party candidates split the Republican Party and enabled Democrats to capture the White House and Congress. We show that the election produced a less-polarized Congress and that newly elected members were more likely to vote for the act. Absent their interparty split, Republicans would likely have held the White House and Congress, and any legislation to establish a central bank almost certainly would have been quite different.
This article documents the prevalence of work from home (WFH) using six nationally representative U.S. surveys. These surveys measure WFH using different questions, reference periods, samples, and survey collection methods. After constructing comparable samples and WFH measures across surveys, we find that the surveys show broadly similar trends in the trajectory of aggregate WFH since the COVID-19 outbreak. The most important source of disagreement in WFH levels across surveys is in WFH by self-employed workers; by contrast, WFH rates for employees are closely aligned across surveys. All surveys show that, in 2024, WFH remains substantially above pre-pandemic levels. We also highlight that while full-time WFH drove most of the increase in aggregate WFH during and after the pandemic, part-time WFH has become a more significant contributor since 2022. Finally, we validate the findings from the survey data by comparing self-reported commuting behavior to cell phone geolocation data from Google Workplace Visits.
This article investigates the impact of the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) on the intangibles of U.S. multinationals. We develop a theoretical model that incorporates key provisions of the TCJA—Global Intangible Low-Taxed Income (GILTI) and Foreign-Derived Intangible Income (FDII)—and derive testable implications for changes in licensing and patent transfer patterns. Using data on international royalty flows and patent assignments, we test the model’s predictions. Our findings suggest that the TCJA may have impacted profit-shifting strategies through intangibles, aligning with our model’s predictions.
