Discussion Paper
Dynamics of the Federal Funds Target Rate: A Nonstationary Discrete Choice Approach
We apply a discrete choice approach to model the empirical behavior of the Federal Reserve in changing the federal funds target rate, the benchmark of short term market interest rates in the US. Our methods allow the explanatory variables to be nonstationary as well as stationary. This feature is particularly useful in the present application as many economic fundamentals that are monitored by the Fed and are believed to affect decisions to adjust interest rate targets display some nonstationarity over time.