The Inflation Process: A Micro-Behavioral Analysis
从微观行为视角分析经济主体如何通过价格设定和信贷需求推动通胀，强调非最大化行为和议价能力的作用，对理解通胀的微观基础有参考价值。
This paper covers some essential ideas of a much larger study by James Dean and myself of the way in which the behavior of economic agents, when aggregated, contributes to the process of inflation. Space limitations dictate a compromise between brevity and minimal completeness. Therefore many of the basic ideas will be stated baldly. Qualifying remarks are omitted. The conventional macro approach can be subsumed under the slogan of too much money chasing a given amount of goods. It does not explain how specific absolute prices are set. Further, a theory of money demand creation from a micro viewpoint is missing. I shall emphasize the world where real live flesh-and-blood humans set prices, and where their activities influence the demand for money. The essential scheme is simplicity itself. Inflation is determined by incentives that lead sellers, using decision rules based mostly on conventional behavior, to raise absolute prices, which in turn creates an increase in the demand for credit which, in its turn, the banking system accommodates to some degree. Can we start with a set of reasonable postulates about firms and markets consistent with this type of firm behavior? I believe we can. The postulates I focus on (taken from X-efficiency theory) can be summarized by the following phrases: 1) inert areas, 2) mostly nonmaximizing behavior, 3) incomplete employment contracts, 4) imperfect markets (including some bargaining power), and 5) a take-it-or-leaveit bargaining style.