Vital Signs. Yet another year of steady rates. What's the point of the RBA inflation target?
- Written by Richard Holden, Professor of Economics, UNSW
The Reserve Bank kicks off its first meeting for the year next Tuesday facing the same dilemma it did throughout last year.
It hasn’t got easier.
The bank has a very public, fairly clear objective: to keep inflation between 2% and 3%. But it keeps missing it. Over and over and over again, and on the downside.
As the following chart shows, inflation has been below the bank’s target band for nearly all of the past four years.
Authors: Richard Holden, Professor of Economics, UNSW