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Natural Rate of Unemployment

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Abstract

Milton Friedman defined the natural rate of unemployment as the level of unemployment that resulted from real economic forces, the long-run level of which could not be altered by monetary policy. Macroeconomic policymakers continue to view the natural rate as a key benchmark due to the belief that monetary policy can counter short-run deviations of the unemployment rate from the natural rate. It is important, however, that policymakers focus as much attention on understanding the real determinants of the natural rate, and the policies that can affect it, as they do on trying to identify and counteract deviations from it.

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Pries, M.J. (2018). Natural Rate of Unemployment. In: The New Palgrave Dictionary of Economics. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-349-95189-5_716

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