Missing Persistence: Measurement Errors and US Inflation before WW1

Stefan Gerlach and Rebecca Stuart

No 20063, CEPR Discussion Papers from Centre for Economic Policy Research

Abstract: It is often noted that US inflation showed little persistence before WW1. It is also often noted historical price series are measured with error. Yet, the question of how such measurement errors could impact on estimates of persistence has not been studied in the literature. We use instrumental variables to study inflation persistence from 1784 to 2023. Before the publication of official price series in 1913, the estimated degree of persistence more than doubles when IV is used. Our findings suggest that inflation persistence is almost unchanged over the last 140 years.

Keywords: Inflation persistence; Instrumental variables; Gold standard; Measurement errors (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: E31 F40 N10 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025-03
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