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on Macroeconomics |
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Issue of 2013‒09‒25
24 papers chosen by Soumitra K Mallick Indian Institute of Social Welfare and Business Management |
| By: | Ozge Akinci |
| Abstract: | This paper uses a panel structural vector autoregressive (VAR) model to investigate the extent to which global financial conditions, i.e., a global risk-free interest rate and global financial risk, and country spreads contribute to macroeconomic fluctuations in emerging countries. The main findings are: (1) Global financial risk shocks explain about 20 percent of movements both in the country spread and in the aggregate activity in emerging economies. (2) The contribution of global risk-free interest rate shocks to macroeconomic fluctuations in emerging economies is negligible. Its role, which was emphasized in the literature, is taken up by global financial risk shocks. (3) Country spread shocks explain about 15 percent of the business cycles in emerging economies. (4) Interdependence between economic activity and the country spread is a key mechanism through which global financial shocks are transmitted to emerging economies. |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedgif:1085&r=mac |
| By: | William Dupor; Rong Li |
| Abstract: | There exist sticky price models in which the output response to a government spending change can be large if the central bank is nonresponsive to inflation. According to this “expected inflation channel," government spending drives up expected inflation, which in turn, reduces the real interest rate and leads to an increase in private consumption. This paper examines whether the channel was important during the 2009 Recovery Act period. Examining U.S. expected inflation measures based on professional surveys and a cross-country comparison of bond yields, we conclude that the Recovery Act had a much smaller expected inflation effect than suggested by an appropriately calibrated large output multiplier" sticky price model. Moreover, we show that the channel is inconsistent quantitatively with vector autoregression evidence from the Federal Reserve's passive policy period. Taking the evidence as a whole, we conclude that if the Act had exhibited a large output multiplier, it was not likely due to the expected inflation channel as formulated in existing research. |
| Keywords: | Monetary policy ; Fiscal policy ; American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedlwp:2013-026&r=mac |
| By: | Norkute, Milda (Department of Economics, Lund University) |
| Abstract: | There is no a priori reason to suppose that price-setting behaviour is homogeneous across sectors and countries. Aggregate data is, however, commonly used to estimate the New Keynesian Phillips curve (NKPC), which may very well yield erroneous results if price-setting behaviour is heterogeneous. In this paper we therefore estimate the hybrid NKPC for the Euro Area using a novel sectoral data set containing quarterly observations from 1999Q1 to 2012Q1. We show that a positive relationship between inflation and real marginal cost cannot be established empirically for a majority of countries and sectors. We also perform a meta-analysis by combining the results of individual significance tests in order to assess the validity of the NKPC in each country across all sectors and in each sector across all countries. We find no empirical evidence for the NKPC in the Euro Area when this meta-analysis is used. Our results therefore raise doubts about the appropriateness of the NKPC for the analysis of inflation dynamics and monetary policy in the Euro Area. |
| Keywords: | New Keynesian Phillips curve; Inflation; Meta-analysis |
| JEL: | C12 E31 |
| Date: | 2013–09–13 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:lunewp:2013_031&r=mac |
| By: | Takushi Kurozumi; Willem Van Zandweghe |
| Abstract: | In the presence of staggered price setting, high trend inflation induces a large deviation of steady-state output from its natural rate and indeterminacy of equilibrium under the Taylor rule. This paper examines the implications of a ''smoothed-off'' kink in demand curves for the natural rate hypothesis and macroeconomic stability using a canonical model with staggered price setting, and sheds light on the relationship between the hypothesis and the Taylor principle. An empirically plausible calibration of the model shows that the kink in demand curves mitigates the influence of price dispersion on aggregate output, thereby ensuring that the violation of the natural rate hypothesis is minor and preventing fluctuations driven by self-fulfilling expectations under the Taylor rule. |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedkrw:rwp13-08&r=mac |
| By: | Mario Forni; Luca Gambetti; Luca Sala |
| Abstract: | A structural Factor-Augmented VAR model is used to evaluate the role of "news" shocks in generating the business cycle. We find that (i) existing small-scale VAR models are affected by "non-fundamentalness" and therefore fail to recover the correct shock and impulse response functions; (ii) news shocks have a smaller role in explaining the business cycle than previously found in the literature; (iii) their effects are essentially in line with what predicted by standard theories; (iv) a substantial fraction of business cycle fluctuations are explained by shocks unrelated to technology. JEL classification: C32, E32, E62. Keywords: Factor-augmented VAR, news shocks, invertibility, fundamentalness. |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:igi:igierp:491&r=mac |
| By: | Manuel Gonzalez-Astudillo |
| Abstract: | In this paper, we formulate and solve a New Keynesian model with monetary and fiscal policy rules whose coefficients are time-varying and interdependent. We implement time variation in the policy rules by specifying coefficients that are logistic functions of correlated latent factors and propose a solution method that allows for these characteristics. The paper uses Bayesian methods to estimate the policy rules with time-varying coefficients, endogeneity, and stochastic volatility in a limited-information framework. Results show that monetary policy switches regime more frequently than fiscal policy, and that there is a non-negligible degree of interdependence between policies. Policy experiments reveal that contractionary monetary policy lowers inflation in the short run and increases it in the long run. Also, lump-sum taxes affect output and inflation, as the literature on the fiscal theory of the price level suggests, but the effects are attenuated with respect to a pure fiscal regime. |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedgfe:2013-58&r=mac |
| By: | James M. Nason; Gregor W. Smith |
| Abstract: | We provide a new way to filter US inflation into trend and cycle components, based on extracting long-run forecasts from the Survey of Professional Forecasters. We operate the Kalman filter in reverse, beginning with observed forecasts, then estimating parameters, and then extracting the stochastic trend in inflation. The trend-cycle model with unobserved components is consistent with numerous studies of US inflation history and is of interest partly because the trend may be viewed as the Fed’s evolving inflation target or long-horizon expected inflation. The sluggish reporting attributed to forecasters is consistent with evidence on mean forecast errors. We find considerable evidence of inflation-gap persistence and some evidence of implicit sticky information. But statistical tests show we cannot reconcile these two widely used perspectives on US inflation forecasts, the unobserved-components model and the sticky-information model. |
| Keywords: | Inflation (Finance) - United States ; Forecasting |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedpwp:13-34&r=mac |
| By: | Ejermo, Olof (CIRCLE, Lund University); Xiao, Jing (CIRCLE, Lund University and Department of Economic History, Lund University, Sweden) |
| Abstract: | We investigate the relationship between the survival performance of new technologybased firms (NTBFs) over the business cycle and compare them against other entrepreneurial firms. Our data comprise the entire population of entrepreneurial firms entering the Swedish economy from 1991 to 2002, which we follow until 2007. Discrete-time duration models are employed to investigate whether the business cycle impacts differently on the survival likelihood of NTBFs vs. other entrepreneurial firms. Our main findings are three. First, NTBFs generally experience a lower hazard rate compared to other entrepreneurial firms. Second, all entrepreneurial firms are sensitive to, and follow a pro-cyclical pattern of survival likelihood over the business cycle. Three, when comparing NTBFs with firms without self-employees we find that NTBFs are more sensitive to business cycle fluctuations |
| Keywords: | new technology-based firms; exit; survival probability; the business cycle; discrete-time duration models; Sweden |
| JEL: | E32 L25 L26 O33 |
| Date: | 2013–05–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:lucirc:2013_019&r=mac |
| By: | Gilles Dufrénot (AMSE - Aix-Marseille School of Economics - Aix-Marseille Univ. - Centre national de la recherche scientifique (CNRS) - École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales [EHESS] - Ecole Centrale Marseille (ECM)); Benjamin Keddad (AMSE - Aix-Marseille School of Economics - Aix-Marseille Univ. - Centre national de la recherche scientifique (CNRS) - École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales [EHESS] - Ecole Centrale Marseille (ECM)) |
| Abstract: | This paper attempts to analyze the relationships between the ASEAN-5 countries' business cycles. We examine the nature of business cycles correlation trying to disentangle between regional spillover effects (expansion and recession phases among the ASEAN-5 are correlated) and global spillovers where the business cycles of other countries (China, Japan and the US) play an important role in synchronizing the activity within the ASEAN-5. We employ a time-varying transition probability Markov switching framework in order to allow the degree of synchronization to fluctuate over time and across the phases of the business cycles. We provide evidence that the signals contained in some leading business cycles can impact the ASEAN-5 countries' individual business cycles. |
| Keywords: | OCA; East Asia; business cycle synchronization; monetary union; markov-switching |
| Date: | 2013–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:wpaper:halshs-00861901&r=mac |
| By: | Zhen Huo; Jose-Victor Rios-Rull |
| Abstract: | We build a variation of the neoclassical growth model in which both wealth shocks (in the sense of wealth destruction) and financial shocks to households generate recessions. The model features three mild departures from the standard model: (1) adjustment costs make it difficult to expand the tradable goods sector by reallocating factors of production from nontradables to tradables; (2) there is a mild form of labor market frictions (Nash bargaining wage setting with Mortensen-Pissarides labor markets); (3) goods markets for nontradables require active search from households wherein increases in consumption expenditures increase measured productivity. These departures provide a novel quantitative theory to explain recessions like those in southern Europe without relying on technology shocks. |
| Keywords: | Recessions ; Productivity |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedmsr:490&r=mac |
| By: | Elliot Anenberg; Patrick Bayer |
| Abstract: | This paper presents new empirical evidence that internal movement--selling one home and buying another--by existing homeowners within a metropolitan housing market is especially volatile and the main driver of fluctuations in transaction volume over the housing market cycle. We develop a dynamic search equilibrium model that shows that the strong pro-cyclicality of internal movement is driven by the cost of simultaneously holding two homes, which varies endogenously over the cycle. We estimate the model using data on prices, volume, time-on-market, and internal moves drawn from Los Angeles from 1988-2008 and use the fitted model to show that frictions related to the joint buyer-seller problem: (i) substantially amplify booms and busts in the housing market, (ii) create counter-cyclical build-ups of mismatch of existing owners with their homes, and (iii) generate externalities that induce significant welfare loss and excess price volatility. |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedgfe:2013-60&r=mac |
| By: | Jiranyakul, Komain |
| Abstract: | This paper explored the degree of inflation persistence in Thailand using both headline and sectoral CPI indices during the 1985-2012 period. The results showed that the degree of persistence was low across the fixed and floating exchange rate regimes. The mean shifts appeared to be mostly negative by the impact of switching from fixed to floating exchange rate regime. Furthermore, there seemed to be monetary accommodation of inflation persistence in both regimes. However, some negative mean shifts in the inflation process might be resulted from the impact of inflation targeting implemented in May 2000. |
| Keywords: | Inflation persistence, exchange rate regimes, monetary accommodation. |
| JEL: | C22 E31 |
| Date: | 2013–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:50109&r=mac |
| By: | Luca Benati; Thomas A. Lubik |
| Abstract: | We use a Bayesian time-varying parameter structural VAR with stochastic volatility to investigate changes in both the reduced-form relationship between vacancies and the unemployment rate, and in their relationship conditional on permanent and transitory output shocks, in the post-WWII United States. Evidence points towards similarities and differences between the Great Recession and the Volcker disinflation, and wide-spread time variation along two key dimensions. First, the slope of the Beveridge curve exhibits a large extent of variation from the mid-1960s on. It is also notably pro-cyclical, whereby the gain is positively correlated with the transitory component of output. The evolution of the slope of the Beveridge curve during the Great Recession is very similar to its evolution during the Volcker recession in terms of both its magnitude and its time profile. Second, both the Great Inflation episode and the subsequent Volcker disinflation are characterized by a significantly larger negative correlation between the reduced-form innovations to vacancies and the unemployment rate than the rest of the sample period. Those years also exhibit a greater cross-spectral coherence between the two series at business-cycle frequencies. This suggests that they are driven by common shocks. |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedrwp:13-12&r=mac |
| By: | Marcelle Chauvet; Zeynep Senyuz; Emre Yoldas |
| Abstract: | This paper provides an extensive analysis of the predictive ability of financial volatility measures for economic activity. We construct monthly measures of stock and bond market volatility from daily returns and model volatility as composed of a long-run component that is common across all series, and a set of idiosyncratic short-run components. Based on powerful in-sample predictive ability tests, we find that the stock volatility measures and the common factor significantly improve short-term forecasts of conventional financial indicators. A real-time out of sample assessment yields a similar conclusion under the assumption of noisy revisions in macroeconomic data. In a non-linear extension of the dynamic factor model for volatility series, we identify three regimes that describe the joint volatility dynamics: low, intermediate and high-volatility. We also find that the non-linear model performs remarkably well in tracking the Great Recession of 2007-2009 in real-time. |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedgfe:2013-61&r=mac |
| By: | Greene, William H.; Gillman, Max; Harris, Mark N. |
| Abstract: | We propose a Tempered Ordered Probit (TOP) model. Our contribution lies not only in explicitly accounting for an excessive number of observations in a given choice category - as is the case in the standard literature on inflated models; rather, we introduce a new econometric model which nests the recently developed Middle Inflated Ordered Probit (MIOP) models of Bagozzi and Mukherjee (2012) and Brooks, Harris, and Spencer (2012) as a special case, and further, can be used as a specification test of the MIOP, where the implicit test is described as being one of symmetry versus asymmetry. In our application, which exploits a panel data-set containing the votes of Bank of England Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) members, we show that the TOP model affords the econometrician considerable flexibility with respect to modeling the impact of different forms of uncertainty on interest rate decisions. Our findings, we argue, reveal MPC members. asymmetric attitudes towards uncertainty and the changeability of interest rates. |
| Keywords: | Monetary policy committee, voting, discrete data, uncertainty, tempered equations |
| JEL: | C3 E50 |
| Date: | 2013–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hit:hitcei:2013-05&r=mac |
| By: | Francisco B. Covas; Ben Rump; Egon Zakrajsek |
| Abstract: | We propose an econometric framework for estimating capital shortfalls of bank holding companies (BHCs) under pre-specified macroeconomic scenarios. To capture the nonlinear dynamics of bank losses and revenues during periods of financial stress, we use a fixed effects quantile autoregressive (FE-QAR) model with exogenous macroeconomic covariates, an approach that delivers a superior out-of-sample forecasting performance compared with the standard linear framework. According to the out-of-sample forecasts, the realized net charge-offs during the 2007-09 crisis are within the multi-step-ahead density forecasts implied by the FE-QAR model, but they are frequently outside the density forecasts generated using the corresponding linear model. This difference reflects the fact that the linear specification substantially underestimates loan losses, especially for real estate loan portfolios. Employing the macroeconomic stress scenario used in CCAR 2012, we use the density forecasts generated by the FE-QAR model to simulate capital shortfalls for a panel of large BHCs. For almost all institutions in the sample, the FE-QAR model generates capital shortfalls that are considerably higher than those implied by its linear counterpart, which suggests that our approach has the potential for detecting emerging vulnerabilities in the financial system. |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedgfe:2013-55&r=mac |
| By: | Oliver de Groot; Fédéric Holm-Hadulla; Nadine Leiner-Killinger |
| Abstract: | Do capital markets impose fiscal discipline on governments? We investigate the responses of fiscal variables to a change in the interest rate paid by governments on their debt in a panel of 14 European countries over four decades. To this end, we estimate a panel vector autoregressive (PVAR) model, using sign restrictions via the penalty function method of Mountford and Uhlig (2009) to identify structural cost of borrowing shocks. Our baseline estimation shows that a 1 percentage point rise in the cost of borrowing leads to a cumulative improvement of the primary balance-to-GDP ratio of approximately 2 percentage points over 10 years, with the fiscal response becoming significantly evident only two years after the shock. We also find that the bulk of fiscal adjustment takes place via a rise in government revenue rather than a cut in primary expenditure. The size of the total fiscal adjustment, however, is insufficient to avoid the gross government debt-to-GDP ratio from rising as a consequence of the shock. Sub-dividing our sample, we also find that for countries participating in Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) the primary balance response to a cost of borrowing shock was stronger in the period after 1992 (the year in which the Maastricht Treaty was signed) than prior to 1992. |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedgfe:2013-59&r=mac |
| By: | Michael Dotsey; Robert G. King; Alexander L. Wolman |
| Abstract: | In the last ten years there has been an explosion of empirical work examining price setting behavior at the micro level. The work has in turn challenged existing macro models that attempt to explain monetary nonneutrality, because these models are generally at odds with much of the micro price data. In response, economists have developed a second generation of sticky-price models that are state dependent and that include both fixed costs of price adjustment and idiosyncratic shocks. Nonetheless, some ambiguity remains about the extent of monetary nonneutrality that can be attributed to costly price adjustment. Our paper takes a step toward eliminating that ambiguity. |
| Keywords: | Pricing ; Pricing - Mathematical models |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedpwp:13-35&r=mac |
| By: | Salustri, Andrea |
| Abstract: | The Italian international reputation in mainly related to the high level of its public debt. During the Great Recession, this fact, associated to the stagnation of productivity, raised serious doubts on its economic and financial sustainability. The doubts are legitimated also by the fact that Italy is a net borrower of capitals from abroad, as its Net International Investment Position (NIIP) is negative. The statistical analysis of the Italian public finances suggests how the deep causes of the Italian financial and economic fragility rest in the malfunctioning of the institutional (public and private) and economic framework. The Italian economy should manage its structural weaknesses: i) by maturing a long term view able to involve the capital stocks in the economic reasoning; ii) by enabling SME and citizens’ participation in all the economic activities; by empowering the third sector and more in general non profit activities in order to facilitate the formation of social capital. |
| Keywords: | Debt-GDP ratio, spending review, economic inclusion |
| JEL: | H50 H63 H72 |
| Date: | 2013–09–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:50113&r=mac |
| By: | Layal Mansour (Université de Lyon, Lyon, F-69007, France ; CNRS, GATE Lyon St Etienne,F-69130 Ecully, France) |
| Abstract: | The aim of this paper is to evaluate the economic consequences on the countries that on one hand protect themselves from future financial crises by accumulating international reserves (IR) while on the other hand expose themselves to severe financial crisis due to their excessive internal and/or external public debt. Using the Financial Stress Indicator (FSI) proposed by Balakrishnan et al (2009) and IMF -which cover several aspects of financial crisis- and by applying the Markov switching model with time varying, we estimated the probability whether an indebted country is vulnerable to crises despite its accumulation of IR -acting as a buffer stock and self-insurance-. We studied the case of five emerging countries in Asia and Latin America that had increased both of their IR and public debts, and found that debt had increased the likelihood for a country to suffer from financial crisis, however IR did not necessarily provide “Peace” in the indebted countries except of some exceptions. We conclude that although debt and international reserves have theoretically opposite economic concerns for a country, the deleterious effects of debts might outweigh in most cases the beneficial effects of IR |
| Keywords: | Monetary policy, International Reserves, External Debts, Financial Crisis, Financial Stress Indicator |
| JEL: | C22 E52 F31 G01 H63 |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:gat:wpaper:1329&r=mac |
| By: | Simon Gilchrist; Egon Zakrajsek |
| Abstract: | Estimating the effect of Federal Reserve's announcements of Large-Scale Asset Purchase (LSAP) programs on corporate credit risk is complicated by the simultaneity of policy decisions and movements in prices of risky financial assets, as well as by the fact that both interest rates of assets targeted by the programs and indicators of credit risk reacted to other common shocks during the recent financial crisis. This paper employs a heteroskedasticity-based approach to estimate the structural coefficient measuring the sensitivity of market-based indicators of corporate credit risk to declines in the benchmark market interest rates prompted by the LSAP announcements. The results indicate that the LSAP announcements led to a significant reduction in the cost of insuring against default risk--as measured by the CDX indexes--for both investment- and speculative-grade corporate credits. While the unconventional policy measures employed by the Federal Reserve to stimulate the economy have substantially lowered the overall level of credit risk in the economy, the LSAP announcements appear to have had no measurable effect on credit risk in the financial intermediary sector. |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedgfe:2013-56&r=mac |
| By: | Jonathan E. Goldberg |
| Abstract: | I study the effects of credit tightening in an economy with uninsured idiosyncratic investment risk. In the model, entrepreneurs require an equity premium because collateral constraints limit insurance. After collateral constraints tighten, the equity premium and the riskiness of consumption rise and the risk-free interest rate falls. I show that, both immediately after the shock and in the long run, the equity premium and the riskiness of consumption increase more than they would if the risk-free rate were constant. Indeed, the long-run increase in the riskiness of consumption growth is purely a general-equilibrium effect: if the risk-free rate were constant (as in a small open economy), an endogenous decrease in risk-taking by entrepreneurs would, in the long run, completely offset the decrease in their ability to diversify. I also show that the credit shock leads to a decrease in aggregate capital if the elasticity of intertemporal substitution is sufficiently high. Finally, I show that, due to a general-equilibrium effect, there is no "overshooting" in the equity premium: in response to a permanent decrease in firms' ability to pledge their future income, the equity premium immediately jumps to its new steady-state level and remains constant thereafter, even as aggregate capital adjusts over time. However, if idiosyncratic uncertainty is sufficiently low, credit tightening has no short- or long-run effects on aggregate capital, the equity premium, or the riskiness of consumption. Thus my paper highlights how investment risk affects the economy's response to a credit crunch. |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedgfe:2013-47&r=mac |
| By: | Svaleryd, Helena (Department of Economics) |
| Abstract: | The business cycle is likely to be of importance for self-employment rates. When the economy is growing, business opportunities open up and encourage the set-up of new firms. In downturns, self-employment may be a way to avoid unemployment. The strength of these pull and push factors may depend on the amount of human capital a person has. The findings in this paper show that although the local business cycle is of minor importance for total self-employment rates in Sweden, there are heterogeneous effects across groups. People with higher human capital endowments are more likely to be pulled into self-employment, while those with lower human capital endowments are to a larger extent pushed into self-employment. This pattern is particularly strong for women. |
| Keywords: | Self-employment; local business cycle; panel data |
| JEL: | J21 J24 |
| Date: | 2013–08–28 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:uunewp:2013_015&r=mac |
| By: | Timothy Uy; Kei-Mu Yi; Jing Zhang |
| Abstract: | We study the importance of international trade in structural change. Our framework has both productivity and trade cost shocks, and allows for non-unitary income and substitution elasticities. We calibrate our model to investigate South Korea's structural change between 1971 and 2005. We find that the shock processes, propagated through the model's two main transmission mechanisms, non-homothetic preferences and the open economy, explain virtually all of the evolution of agriculture and services labor shares, and the rising part of the hump-shape in manufacturing. Counterfactual exercises show that the role of the open economy is quantitatively important for explaining South Korea's structural change. |
| Keywords: | Gross domestic product ; Labor mobility ; Manufacturing industries |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedhwp:wp-2013-09&r=mac |