I Discovered the Phillips Curve: "A Statistical Relation between Unemployment and Price Changes"

Abstract

The possible relation between changes in the price level and changes in the volume of employment, much discussed by economists at the present time, has already been debated in the pages of the Review. In the present article Professor Fisher, one of the foremost authorities on monetary problems and for years a protagonist of stabilisation, removes the question from the sphere of controversy to that of exact statistical research. He has found a remarkably high correlation between the rate of price changes and employment, and he describes the methods by which he has achieved this result. The data used refer exclusively to the United States, and further research would be required before the conclusions could be applied directly to other countries. Nevertheless, this objective statistical confirmation of a relation long asserted to exist is a highly important step in advance.