Monetary Policy Tightening and Economic Landing

Will the landing be hard or soft?

Azhar Iqbal

Published: December 2022


This article presents a new approach for estimating the optimal nominal interest rate and labels it the appropriate-FFR. The analysis suggests that the US Federal Reserve is behind the curve in the present cycle and also predicts a hard landing using both the FOMC and Blue Chip consensus forecasts. Given the historical accuracy of our method, we caution decision makers to consider the possibility of a hard landing in the near future.



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Characterizing Stagflation into Mild, Moderate and Severe Episodes

The study proposes a new framework to classify stagflation into mild, moderate, or severe episodes based on the magnitude and duration of high inflation and low-output growth. It uses the CPI and PCE deflators as inflation measures, real GDP as output growth measure, and a time-varying benchmark for growth and inflation to account for the changing nature of the US economy. The article identifies 13 episodes of stagflation from 1947 to Q1-2024, with five mild, four moderate, and four severe cases. The current episode (Q2–2021 to Q1-2024) is severe and the second-longest in history. The findings use Bloomberg’s consensus projections to estimate the end of the current stagflation episode by Q1–2024, and discuss the policy implications and lessons from past episodes.

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