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Empirical Testing of the New Keynesian Phillips Curve in the Czech Republic
Plašil, Miroslav ; Arlt, Josef (advisor) ; Pánková, Václava (referee) ; Komárek, Luboš (referee)
New keynesian Phillips curve (NKPC) has become a central model to study the relation between inflation and real economic activity, notably in the framework of optimal monetary policy design. However, some recent evidence suggests that empirical data are usually at odds with the underlying theory. The model due to its inherent structure represents a statistical challenge in its own right. Since Galí and Gertler (1999) published their seminal paper introducing estimation via GMM techniques, they have triggered a heated debate on its empirical relevance. Their approach has been heavily criticised by later authors, mainly on the grounds of questionable behaviour of GMM estimator in the NKPC context and/or its small sample properties. The common criticism includes sensitivity to the choice of instrument set, weak identification and small sample bias. In this thesis I propose a new estimation strategy that provides a remedy to above mentioned shortcomings and allows to obtain reliable estimates. The procedure exploits recent advances in GMM theory as well as in other fields of statistics, in particular in the area of time series factor analysis and bootstrap. The proposed estimation strategy consists of several consecutive steps: first, to reduce a small sample bias resulting from excessive use of instruments I summarize all available information by employing factor analysis and include estimated factors into information set. In the second step I use statistical information criteria to select optimal instruments and eventually I obtain confidence intervals on parameters using bootstrap method. In NKPC context all these methods were used for the first time and can also be used independently. Their combination however provides synergistic effect that helps to improve the properties of estimates and to check the efficiency of given steps. Obtained results suggest that NKPC model can explain Czech inflation dynamics fairly well and provide some support for underlying theory. Among other things the results imply that the policy of disinflation may not be as costly with respect to a loss in aggregate product as earlier versions of Phillips curve would indicate. However, finding a good proxy for real economic activity has proved to be a difficult task. In particular we demonstrated that results are conditional on how the measure is calculated, some measures even showed countercyclical behaviour. This issue -- in the thesis discussed only in passing -- is a subject of future research. In addition to the proposed strategy and provided parameter estimates the thesis brings some partial simulation-based findings. Simulations elaborate on earlier literature on naive bootstrap in GMM context and study performance of bootstrap modifications of unit root and KPSS test.
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