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※ 번역할 언어 선택

Energy Prices and the U.S. Business Cycle

William Poole*
President, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis

Global Interdependence Center (GIC) Abroad in Chile Conference
American Chamber of Commerce in Chile Breakfast
Santiago, Chile
March 2, 2007

*I appreciate comments provided by my colleagues at the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. Edward Nelson, assistant vice president, provided special assistance. I take full responsibility for errors. The views expressed are mine and do not necessarily reflect official positions of the Federal Reserve System.

Energy Prices and the U.S. Business Cycle

A staple of the macroeconomics literature is that energy price shocks have been an important contributor to U.S. recessions. The situation is clearly more complicated than the common macro textbook exercise of using standard diagrams to work out the effects of an energy shock. Recent experience with a near tripling of oil prices from mid 2003 to mid 2006 without a recession suggests the need to review the conventional wisdom. One of my messages will be that the conventional wisdom fails to consider the fact that previous oil price shocks occurred when the U.S. economy was already suffering from substantial inflation pressures, whereas the recent run-up of oil prices has occurred in an economy with substantial overall price stability and entrenched, low inflation expectations.

Before I dig into the issue of the extent of causality between oil price shocks and recessions, I want to emphasize that the views I express here are mine and do not necessarily reflect official positions of the Federal Reserve System. I thank my colleagues at the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis for their comments; Ed Nelson, asistant vice president, provided special assistance. However, I retain full responsibility for errors.
The Debate

The historical record since 1970 provides some perspective on the relationship between oil prices and the business cycle. The figure (at end of text) plots the U.S. benchmark oil price (the West Texas intermediate spot price), both in nominal terms (i.e., current U.S. dollars) and real terms (i.e., deflated by the CPI so as to be in constant 1982-84 dollars) since 1970. Shaded regions denote U.S. recessions, as designated by the National Bureau of Economic Research. These include the recession of 1973-75, associated with the oil price shock of 1973-74, the recessions of 1980 and 1981-82, preceded by the second oil shock in 1979, and the recession of 1990-91, also associated with a large, but more transitory, oil price increase of about 75 percent in 1990-91. There are also more drawn-out but steep oil increases in 1999-2000 and 2003-2006. The presence of the recession bars in the graph brings out what Hamilton and Herrera (2004, p. 265) observe is “a correlation between increases in oil prices and subsequent economic downturns.” In particular, recessions began in the United States within a year of the 1973, 1979 and 1990 oil price increases.

There has been much debate on how much of this link between recessions and prior oil price increases should be attributed to the powerful effect of oil shocks on the economy, and how much reflects a third factor—more restrictive monetary policy imposed at roughly the same time as the oil shocks. But I would draw attention to another aspect of the relationship between the business cycle and oil prices highlighted by the figure. The United States has never had an energy price spike occur in the middle of a recession, or immediately following a recession when unemployment is still relatively high. This fact suggests two properties of large oil price increases that are useful to keep in mind. First, very sharp increases in oil prices that we have observed historically, while undoubtedly reflecting exogenous supply disruptions to some degree, also reflect the strength of the economy at the time. Secondly, the casual association often made, based on the 1970s experience, between oil price increases and high inflation, is largely misguided because the large oil price increases of the 1970s occurred against the background of cyclical expansions that had gone too far.

The 1973 and 1979 episodes did not feature inflationary spirals triggered by the oil shocks. Instead, they are characterized by preexisting, general inflationary pressures that an alternative monetary policy could have avoided. The first oil shock in 1973 occurred against a background of clear economic overheating in the United States. U.S. monetary policy was very expansionary in 1971 and 1972, leading to excessive growth of aggregate demand that, even in the presence of price controls, spilled over into rising inflation in 1973. By October 1973—that is, the month of the first oil shock, but largely before its impact could be felt in the CPI—inflation had reached 8.1 percent on a 12-month basis, a sharp rise from the 3.2 percent rate over the 12 months ending in October 1972. Annual CPI inflation subsequently rose to 11.8 percent in October 1974 and peaked at 12.2 percent in November 1974.

Similarly, in the wake of several years of expanding demand, inflation rose throughout most of 1977 and 1978, well before the second oil shock, and the 12-month rate stood at 9.3 percent in January 1979, 2.5 percentage points above its value of January 1978. Inflation subsequently peaked at 14.6 percent in March 1980. Even the 1990 oil price spike occurred late in a long economic expansion, with annual inflation having stood above 4 percent since mid-1988. In July 1990, the 12-month CPI inflation rate was 4.8 percent, too high to correspond to price stability and not far below the July 1989 value of 5.1 percent. Following the oil shock that began in August 1990, inflation peaked at 6.4 percent in October 1990.

The strength of the economy at the time of the three oil shocks is also reflected in the unemployment rate. In October 1973, the seasonally adjusted U.S. unemployment rate stood at 4.6 percent, its lowest rate since early 1970; in January 1979 it was 5.9 percent, close to its trough for the late 1970s expansion; and in July 1990, unemployment was 5.5 percent, above its March 1989 low of 5.0 percent, but still lower than its value in any month in the years 1975-1987.

This emphasis on the link between the state of the business cycle and the strength of oil prices may seem surprising. Many of the well-known spikes in the oil price are associated with exogenous events on the supply side: for example, OPEC’s quadrupling of the oil price in late 1973 in the wake of the Middle East war; OPEC’s doubling of the oil price in 1979 following the revolution in Iran; and Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait in 1990. These events were certainly major supply-side disruptions. But even a cartel like OPEC that administers the price of its product cannot ignore market conditions. In particular, a reason why OPEC was able to sustain the very large 1973 oil price increase for so long was because world demand for oil was underpinned by rapid expansion of aggregate demand in key markets in Europe, Japan and the United States. Indeed, some analysts of the 1973 oil shock have cast doubt on whether the oil price increase of 1973 can be considered an exogenous event at all; Barsky and Kilian (2001) argue that it was a delayed response to long-term demand developments in the oil market, combined with a response to contemporaneous buoyant world demand conditions.(1) We do not have to go this far, however, to recognize that there was a significant endogenous component to the oil price increases in 1973 and 1979 due to demand factors, reflecting an overheating of the U.S. economy which coincided with boom conditions in other advanced economies.
Oil Prices and Inflation

Members of the FOMC, as well as monetary policy makers in Europe and the United Kingdom, have spoken about oil prices and inflation on many occasions in recent years. Despite differences in emphasis, a clear proposition runs through these discussions: Irrespective of the behavior of oil prices, we can be confident that monetary policy oriented to price stability will deliver control over inflation over the medium term. It is worth spelling out this proposition in some detail.

The reason why price stability is not contingent on oil price behavior is that inflation is a sustained rise in the general level of prices. The price of oil enters heavily into a particular category of consumer prices—gasoline prices—and indirectly into the prices of many other products. It is possible for the price of energy-intensive goods to change relative to a general index of prices; in fact, such relative-price movements are part of the everyday workings of a market economy. And, over periods of, say, a year or more it is possible for monetary policy to secure low inflation—which means low growth rates in indexes of overall prices—even when energy price inflation is high. Over time, the general level of prices responds to the supply-demand imbalance in the economy: that is, to longer-term movement in total spending in the economy relative to long-run supply potential. Monetary policy actions affect the total volume of spending, and so can influence the balance between aggregate demand and supply. By keeping aggregate demand in balance with aggregate supply, monetary policy can create conditions for general price stability, even if certain components in the price index are persistently increasing.

Two aspects of this picture are worth emphasizing. First, the overall price level is susceptible to influence by monetary policy even if the price of oil, or other commodities, is being driven by exogenous supply events. That is why Milton Friedman could advance his proposition that “inflation is always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon” even though he acknowledged that the 1973 OPEC shock had produced a “drastic alteration in the conditions of supply of crude oil.”(2) The general trend of prices is distinct from the behavior of a single price in the index or subset of the index. Inflation is always an endogenous variable in the medium term, whatever exogenous shocks are affecting its components in the short term.

Secondly, monetary policymakers often pay attention to “core” measures of prices that exclude energy and food prices. This focus does not, however, mean that policymakers’ concept of price stability refers only to a basket of goods that excludes energy-intensive items. The overall cost of living is what matters for welfare, so stability over time in indexes that include energy is desirable. But because the price of gasoline is volatile, it is often desirable to “see through” very short-term movements in consumer prices, and work out what is happening to the underlying trend of prices. Looking at core measures of inflation can be useful for this purpose. Indeed core and aggregate inflation clearly move together over longer periods. That said, during periods of sustained increases in relative energy prices, general price stability requires that price indexes that exclude energy will need to grow more slowly than the aggregate price index; over this period, achievement of inflation at a desirable level means that core inflation, on average, proceeds below the overall level of inflation.

Thirdly, an oil price increase may reduce aggregate supply and policymakers also need to take this fact into account in keeping demand and supply in balance. This issue is most prominent when the oil price change is permanent and when the economy’s technology is very energy-intensive on average. The 1973 oil shock, for example, was long-lasting and took place at a time when U.S. production was very energy-inefficient. Potential output thus fell substantially. The economy was already overheated by 1973; so, some reining in of spending by monetary policy was justified even before the oil shock; but once the oil shock took place, monetary policy needed to tighten, just to keep supply and demand from going further into imbalance. That is, it was necessary to let actual output fall with the decline in potential output. From this perspective, Hamilton and Herrera (2004) are not necessarily posing the right question when they ask how much of a monetary policy loosening would have been required to avoid a recession after the 1973 oil shock. The supply shock alone justified a monetary policy tightening on stabilization grounds.

In recent years, on the other hand, the circumstances of the 1973 oil shock have not been repeated. The economy has not been overheated; the economy is more energy-efficient so the impact on supply of oil shocks has been moderated; and the more severe spikes in the oil price such as in summer 2006 have been recognized as transitory in nature. In these circumstances, monetary policy is in a much better position to support aggregate demand in the face of oil shocks without endangering medium-term price stability. This state of affairs has been emphasized by the Federal Reserve Chairman in his discussion of the effect of oil shocks (Bernanke, 2006).

In summary, maintenance of low inflation over a period of several years or more is achievable whatever happens to oil prices. The same was true in the 1970s, and the fact that inflation was high on average reflected over-expansionary monetary policy, not the oil shocks.
Recent Oil Price Increases

The oil price increase in 2003-2006 is in line with the earlier pattern that surges in oil prices occur during economic expansions. Indeed, recent increases are more clearly a demand phenomenon than the previous increases. Energy prices in recent years have been driven by demand rather than supply. The source of this demand is unusual compared to the past, with a smaller contribution of U.S. demand and a much larger contribution of China. China’s net imports of oil were projected to be 2.3 percent of its GDP in 2006 compared to 0.9 percent in 2002 (IMF, 2006, p. 31). A longer-term perspective is given by the fact that China’s share of world demand for oil is estimated to have risen from 3.5 percent in 1990 to around 8.2 percent in 2006 (Weber, 2006). This increase reflects the rapid growth and industrialization of China in the past fifteen years, as well as the use of production technology that is, on average, energy-inefficient compared to the United States.
Conclusions

Without question, energy supply shocks are disruptive, but they need not create recessions. Indeed, there is a more general lesson from experience with oil price shocks. Monetary policy should not allow an economy to operate at the edge of a cliff. When balanced precariously at the edge of a cliff, even a minor disturbance, oil or otherwise, may be sufficient to push the economy over the edge. Although an outside shock may be the catalyst, or trigger, that creates undue inflation pressures, the fundamental problem is not the catalyst but the powerful and risky brew of an overheated economy. To use another analogy, if someone opens gas jets and fills a house with gas, do we blame the explosion on the person who lights the match or the person who opened the jets? I know where I want to place the blame.


Footnotes

1. See Hamilton (2003, pp. 388-89) for a rebuttal of Barsky and Kilian’s (2001) position that the 1973-74 oil price increase did not incorporate a major exogenous supply shift.

2. Friedman and Schwartz (1982, p. 414).


References

Barsky, Robert B., and Lutz Kilian (2001). “Do We Really Know That Oil Caused the Great Stagflation? A Monetary Alternative,” NBER Macroeconomics Annual, Vol. 16(1), 137-183.

Bernanke, Ben S. (2006). “Energy and the Economy.” Remarks before the Economic Club of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, June 15.

Friedman, Milton, and Anna J. Schwartz (1982). Monetary Trends in the United States and the United Kingdom. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Hamilton, James D. (2003). “What Is an Oil Shock?,” Journal of Econometrics, Vol. 113(2), 363-398.

Hamilton, James D., and Ana Maria Herrera (2004). “Oil Shocks and Aggregate Macroeconomic Behavior: The Role of Monetary Policy,” Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Vol. 36(2), 265-286.

International Monetary Fund (2006). People’s Republic of China—Article IV Consultation: Staff Report. Washington, D.C.

Weber, Axel A. (2006). “Oil Price Shocks and Monetary Policy in the Euro Area.” Whitaker Lecture by President of the Deutsche Bundesbank.


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LG전자, 홈로봇 '클로이드' CES 공개 [라스베이거스=뉴스핌] 김아영 기자 = LG전자가 오는 6일(현지시간) 미국 라스베이거스에서 개막하는 세계 최대 가전·IT 전시회 CES 2026에서 홈로봇 'LG 클로이드(LG CLOiD)'를 공개한다고 4일 밝혔다. LG 클로이드는 AI 홈로봇의 역할과 가능성을 보여주는 콘셉트 제품이다. 사용자의 스케줄과 집 안 환경을 고려해 작업 우선순위를 정하고, 여러 가전을 제어하는 동시에 일부 가사도 직접 수행하며 비서 역할을 수행한다. 이번 공개는 '가사 해방을 통한 삶의 가치 제고(Zero Labor Home, Makes Quality Time)'를 지향해온 LG전자 가전 전략의 연장선이라는 것이 회사 측 설명이다. LG 클로이드가 세탁 완료된 수건을 개켜 정리하는 모습. [사진=LG전자] ◆CES서 보여주는 '제로 레이버 홈' 관람객은 CES 전시 부스에서 클로이드가 구현하는 '제로 레이버 홈' 시나리오를 볼 수 있다. 출근 준비로 바쁜 거주자를 대신해 전날 세운 식단에 맞춰 냉장고에서 우유를 꺼내고, 오븐에 크루아상을 넣어 아침 식사를 준비하는 모습 등이 연출된다. 차 키와 발표용 리모컨 등 일정에 맞는 준비물을 챙겨 전달하는 장면도 포함된다. LG 클로이드가 크루아상을 오븐에 넣으며 식사를 준비하는 모습. [사진=LG전자] 거주자가 집을 비운 동안에는 세탁물 바구니에서 옷을 꺼내 세탁기에 넣고, 세탁이 끝난 수건을 개켜 정리하는 시나리오가 제시된다. 청소로봇이 움직일 때 동선 위 장애물을 치워 청소 효율을 높이는 역할도 수행한다. 홈트레이닝 시에는 아령을 들어 올린 횟수를 세어주는 등 거주자의 일상 케어 기능도 시연한다. 이러한 동작은 상황 인식, 라이프스타일 학습, 정교한 모션 제어 능력이 결합돼 구현된다는 설명이다. ◆가사용 폼팩터·VLM·VLA로 최적화 클로이드는 머리와 두 팔이 달린 상체와 휠 기반 자율주행 하체로 구성된다. 허리 각도를 조정해 높이를 약 105cm에서 143cm까지 바꿀 수 있으며, 약 87cm 길이의 팔로 바닥이나 다소 높은 위치의 물체도 집을 수 있다. LG 클로이드가 거주자 위한 식사로 크루아상을 준비하는 모습.[사진=LG전자] 양팔은 어깨 3축(앞뒤·좌우·회전), 팔꿈치 1축, 손목 3축(앞뒤·좌우·회전) 등 총 7자유도(DoF)를 적용해 사람 팔과 유사한 움직임을 구현한다. 다섯 손가락도 개별 관절을 가져 섬세한 동작이 가능하도록 설계됐다. 하체에는 청소로봇·Q9·서빙·배송 로봇 등에서 축적한 휠 자율주행 시스템을 적용해 무게 중심을 아래에 두고, 외부 힘에도 균형을 유지하면서 상체의 정밀한 움직임을 지원한다. 이족보행보다 비용 부담이 낮다는 점도 상용화 측면의 장점으로 꼽힌다. LG 클로이드가 홈트레이닝을 돕는 모습. [사진=LG전자] 머리 부분은 이동형 AI 홈 허브 'LG Q9' 기능을 수행한다. 칩셋, 디스플레이, 스피커, 카메라, 각종 센서, 음성 기반 생성형 AI를 탑재해 언어·표정으로 사용자를 인식·응답하고, 라이프스타일과 환경을 학습해 가전 제어에 반영한다. LG전자는 자체 개발 시각언어모델(VLM)과 시각언어행동(VLA) 기술을 칩셋에 적용했다. 피지컬 AI 모델 기반으로 수만 시간 가사 작업 데이터를 학습시켜 홈로봇에 맞게 튜닝했다는 설명이다. VLM은 카메라로 들어온 시각 정보를 언어로 해석하고, 음성·텍스트 명령을 시각 정보와 연계해 이해하는 역할을 맡는다. VLA는 이렇게 통합된 시각·언어 정보를 토대로 로봇의 구체적인 행동 계획과 실행을 담당한다. 여기에 LG의 AI 홈 플랫폼 '씽큐(ThinQ)', 허브 '씽큐 온'과 연결 가전이 더해지면 서비스 범위가 넓어진다. 예를 들어 가족과 씽큐 앱에서 나눈 메뉴 대화를 기반으로 식단을 계획하고, 날씨 정보와 창문 개폐 상태를 조합해 비가 오면 창문을 닫는 등의 시나리오가 가능하다. 퇴근 시간에 맞춰 세탁·건조를 마치고 운동복과 수건을 꺼내 준비하는 연출도 제시된다. ◆로봇 액추에이터 브랜드 'LG 악시움' 첫 공개 LG전자는 홈로봇을 포함한 로봇 사업을 중장기 성장축으로 보고 조직·기술 강화에 나서고 있다. 최근 조직개편에서 HS사업본부 산하에 HS로보틱스연구소를 신설해 전사에 흩어져 있던 홈로봇 관련 역량을 모으고, 차별화 기술 확보와 제품 경쟁력 제고를 목표로 삼았다. LG 액추에이터 악시움(AXIUM) 이미지. [사진=LG전자] 이번 CES에서는 로봇용 액추에이터 브랜드 'LG 액추에이터 악시움(LG Actuator AXIUM)'도 처음 공개한다. '악시움'은 관절을 뜻하는 'Axis'와 Maximum·Premium을 결합해 고성능 액추에이터를 지향한다는 의미를 담았다. 액추에이터는 모터·드라이버·감속기를 통합한 모듈로 로봇 관절에 해당하며, 로봇 제조원가에서 비중이 큰 핵심 부품이다. 피지컬 AI 확산과 함께 성장성이 높은 후방 산업으로 평가된다. LG전자는 가전 사업을 통해 고성능 모터·부품 기술을 축적해왔다. AI DD 모터, 초고속 청소기용 모터(분당 15만rpm), 드라이버 일체형 모터 등 연간 4,000만 개 이상 모터를 자체 생산하고 있다. 회사는 이 같은 기술력이 액추에이터의 경량·소형·고효율·고토크 구현에 기반이 될 것으로 기대한다. 휴머노이드 한 대에 수십 개 액추에이터가 필요한 만큼, LG의 모듈형 설계 역량도 맞춤형 다품종 생산에 도움이 될 것으로 전망된다. ◆홈로봇 성능·폼팩터 진화 지속…축적된 로봇 기술은 가전에 확대 적용 LG전자는 집안일을 하는 데 가장 실용적인 기능과 형태를 갖춘 홈로봇을 지속 개발하는 동시에 청소로봇과 같은 '가전형 로봇(Appliance Robot)'과 사람이 가까이 가면 문이 자동으로 열리는 냉장고처럼 '로보타이즈드 가전(Robotized Appliance)' 등 축적된 로봇 기술을 가전에도 확대 적용할 계획이다. AI가전과 홈로봇에게 가사일을 맡기고, 사람은 쉬고 즐기며 가치 있는 일에만 시간을 쓰는 AI홈을 만드는 것이 목표다. 백승태 LG전자 HS사업본부장 부사장은 "인간과 교감하며 깊이 이해해 최적화된 가사 노동을 제공하는 홈로봇 'LG 클로이드'를 비롯해 '제로 레이버 홈' 비전을 향한 노력을 지속해 나갈 것"이라고 밝혔다. aykim@newspim.com 2026-01-04 10:00
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의대 정시 지원자 5년 만에 최저 [서울=뉴스핌] 정일구 기자 = 올해 의과대학 정시모집 지원자가 큰 폭으로 줄어 최근 5년 중 최저치를 기록했다. 4일 종로학원에 따르면 2026학년도 전국 39개 의대 정시모집 지원자는 7125명으로 전년대비 32.3% 감소했다. 지원자는 2022학년도 9233명, 2023학년도 844명, 2024학년도 8098명, 2025학년도 1만518명으로 집계됐다. 사진은 4일 서울 시내의 한 의과대학 모습. 2026.01.04 mironj19@newspim.com   2026-01-04 15:57
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