Monetary Policy and the Transaction Role of Money in the US

Abstract

The declining importance of money in transactions can explain the well‐known fact that US interest rate policy was passive in the pre‐Volcker period and active after 1982. We generalise a standard cashless new Keynesian model (Woodford, 2003) by incorporating an explicit transaction role for money. In the pre‐Volcker period, we estimate that money did play an important role and determinacy required a passive interest rate policy. However, after 1982, money no longer played an important role in facilitating transactions. Correspondingly, the conventional view prevails and an active policy ensured equilibrium determinacy.