Blueprints for Exchange Rate Management
Based on a CEPR conference on 'International Regimes and Macroeconomic Policy', this book addresses the growing debate over proposals for international monetary reform and the tentative attempts, for example at the Louvre and Plaza accords, to acheive greater coordination of macroeconomic policies. The first section draws lessons from the experience of the interwar Gold Standard, the Bretton Woods system and the EMS. Four papers examine the theoretical issues underlying the design of coordinated economic policies; contributors explore the use of commodity prices as indicators of inflationary pressures, and analyse exchange rate target bands using concepts first developed in the financial literature. The final chapters present empirical evaluations of the performance of alternative exchange rate regimes, adding to the existing literature on the design of and gains from coordinated economic policies.
