A Test on the Efficiency of Monetary Policy in Korea

This paper evaluates the efficiency of monetary policy in Korea within the framework of interest rate feedback rules. For this, a small open macroeconomic model is constructed in a similar fashion to Ball (1999). The model is shown to capture key features of the Korean economy well. Using this estimated model, optimal instrument rules are derived for a set of different monetary policy objectives. Empirical results find that the actual monetary policy in the class of instrument rules was not very effective in stabilizing the output gap relative to inflation. However, seemingly successful inflation stabilization observed in the data are not consistent with the policy rules as the reaction of the interest rate to inflation is very low. It also appears that the central bank did not react right to movements in the real exchange rate. This paper offers some suggestions for the conduct of monetary policy in Korea