Define the concept of the real exchange rate and explain how it differs from the nominal exchange rate

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

In general, the real exchange rate between two countries' currencies is the price of the second country's commodity basket (in terms of the first country's currency) relative to the price of the first country's commodity basket. For example, in the case of U.S. and Europe, the real dollar/euro exchange rate is the dollar value of Europe's price level divided by the U.S. price level. We can thus denote the real dollar/euro exchange rate ( ) as:
= ( × PE)/PUS
where is the nominal dollar/euro exchange rate, PE is Europe's price level, and PUS is the U.S. price level. Unlike the real exchange rate, which is the relative price of two output baskets, the nominal exchange rate is the relative price of two currencies. However, as we can see from the equation above, real exchange rates are defined in terms of nominal exchange rates.