Relationship building with Boston Central Bank
Start date
October 2019End date
January 2020Overview
By setting taxes and interest rates, fiscal and monetary policies have a strong impact on economic outcomes such as unemployment and inflation, and therefore play a crucial role in maintaining and improving the welfare of citizens.
Research by Professor Ricardo Nunes has had a significant impact on monetary and fiscal policy both in the UK and internationally. His research on the objectives of central banks was key to the Swedish parliament review and the resulting changes to the policy objectives of the Swedish central bank. This research also had impact on policy-making in the central bank of the United States.
The IAA Rapid Response funding paid for the translation of key pieces of evidence from Swedish to English which demonstrated how his research on the objectives of central banks was key to the Swedish parliament review and had resulted in changes to the policy objectives of the Swedish central bank. The funding also financed Professor Nunes’ visit to the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, to enable him to advance a number of projects, which it is anticipated will have subsequent policy impact.
Team
Researcher
Professor Ricardo Praca Cavaco Nunes
Professor of Economics
Biography
Ricardo Nunes is a Professor in the School of Economics at the University of Surrey. He graduated from Universitat Pompeu Fabra (Barcelona, Spain) obtaining a MSc in Economics in 2003 and a PhD in Economics in 2007. After graduating he spent 10 years in the Federal Reserve System under various roles. In 2007 he joined the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, where he worked as an economist and senior economist. In 2014 he moved to the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston working as a senior economist and policy advisor. He has held research visitor roles at several central banks and international institutions such as the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, the Bank of England, the IMF, and the Bank of Portugal. From 2018 to 2020 he was appointed to the Council of Economic Advisers to the Chancellor of the Exchequer.
His main research is on monetary and fiscal policy, both theoretical and applied. He has published in leading academic journals including the Quarterly Journal of Economics, Journal of Political Economy, American Economic Review: Insights, Journal of Monetary Economics, Journal of Economic Theory, Journal of the European Economic Association, among others.
Impact
On completing his project, Professor Nunes said:
“This visit was very important to advance several collaborative projects with the economists at the FRB Boston. One project on the nonlinearities of economic mechanisms made significant progress in this visit and is now being considered for an academic journal as well (which is important to establish the credibility of the impact in such prestigious institutions).
Another project on the effects of monetary policy is still at a preliminary stage, but due to several meetings in-person we were able to advance this project as well. Both projects are co-authored with economists at the FRB of Boston.
In this visit I also presented another on-going research project to economists at the Bank and was able to identify policy questions in which the FRB Boston are interested. I have subsequently started a research project with PhD students at Surrey which is related to these.
The impact process in these institutions can be highly unpredictable since much depends on the specific developments in the economy. But impact has been produced in the past due to these visits and I expect that this and future visits will also lead to further impact in the future.”
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