Sticky Information Versus Sticky Prices: A Horse Race Under a General Price-Setting Scheme

Abstract

This paper compares sticky-price and sticky-information model under a more general staggering price-setting scheme. Different to Mankiw and Reis (2002), who show that, under the Calvo staggering assumption, two models generate very different inflation dynamics, I extend the constant-hazard function underlying the Calvo assumption to a general hazard function. I find that, without strategic complementarity in the price-setting, two models generate similar inflation dynamics. The distribution of price durations dominates the shape of impulse response in both models. Furthermore, with strategic complementarity, the hazard function continues to play an important role in forming inflation. In particular, under increasing hazard functions, the inflation response of the sticky-price model is more consistent with the SVAR evidence than the sticky-information model.