Rational expectations in macroeconomics : an introduction to theory and evidence /

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Bibliographic Details
Author / Creator:Attfield, C. L. F. (Clifford L. F.)
Imprint:Oxford, UK ; New York, NY, USA : B. Blackwell, 1985.
Description:xii, 211 p. : ill. ; 24 cm.
Language:English
Subject:Rational expectations (Economic theory)
Macroeconomics
Macroeconomics.
Rational expectations (Economic theory)
Format: Print Book
URL for this record:http://pi.lib.uchicago.edu/1001/cat/bib/729143
Hidden Bibliographic Details
Other authors / contributors:Demery, David
Duck, N. W. (Nigel W.)
ISBN:063113663X
0631139648 (pbk.)
Notes:Includes indexes.
Bibliography: p. [199]-205.
Review by Choice Review

This is yet another treatise summarizing, for persons with appreciable though nontechnical training in economics and mathematics, the nature of the rational expectations hypothesis; the book concentrates on its strongest-or most distinctive-form, and its policy implications. The main macropolicy implication is that deliberate, and thus predictable, policy can have no nontransient impact on real output. The book's major contribution, and the one that distinguishes it from most other studies at the intermediate level, is its in-depth examination of criticisms of the hypothesis. A major point is that the rational expectations model yields outcomes that vary markedly from the outcomes of other models of macroeconomic behavior. Thus, the hypothesis is potentially ``testable.'' But ``outcome tests'' by other scholars, imaginatively summarized here, are still not conclusive. The authors conclude that the hypothesis is clearly an important theoretical contribution and has caused fundamental reexamination of much of macroeconomic and monetary theory. Although its form is wonderfully susceptible to rigorous analytical treatment, the authors claim that it is much too early to deem the hypothesis reliable for purposes of important issues such as macropolicy formulation. They make a strong case for more extensive empirical work both on its building-block assumptions and on its outcome predictions, and they point out a number of avenues along which empirical research might yield telltale results. The up-to-date bibliography directs us to the high spots of research on national expectations. Upper-division and graduate students.-M.O. Clement, Dartmouth College

Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.
Review by Choice Review