Intersectoral Labor Immobility,Sectoral Comovement,and News Shocks

Sectoral comovement of output and hours worked is a prominent feature of business cycle data. However, most two‐sector neoclassical models fail to generate this sectoral comovement. We construct and estimate a two‐sector neoclassical Dynamic Stochastic General Equilibrium (DGSE) model generating sectoral comovement in response to both anticipated and unanticipated shocks. The key to our model's success is a significant degree of intersectoral labor immobility, which we estimate using data on sectoral hours worked. Furthermore, we demonstrate that imperfect intersectoral labor mobility provides a better explanation for the sectoral comovement than an alternative model emphasizing the role of labor‐supply wealth effects.     

What do technology shocks tell us about the New Keynesian paradigm?

Researchers have used unanticipated changes to monetary policy to identify preference and technology parameters of macroeconomic models. This paper uses changes in technology to identify the same set of parameters. Estimates based on technology shocks differ substantially from those based on monetary policy shocks. In the post-World War II United States, a positive technology shock reduces inflation and increases hours worked, significantly and rapidly in both cases. Relative to policy shock identification, technology shock identification implies: (i) long duration durability in preferences instead of short duration habit, (ii) built-in inflation inertia disappears and price flexibility increases. In response to technological improvement, consumption durability increases hours worked because households temporarily increase labor supply to accumulate durables towards a new, higher steady state level. Limited nominal rigidities allow inflation to fall because firms are able to immediately cut prices when households’ labor supply increases. Finally, we consider alternative data constructions and econometric specifications; we find that (i) and/or (ii) hold in nearly every case.     

The Response of Hours to a Technology Shock: A Two-Step Structural VAR Approach

The response of hours to a technology shock is a controversial issue in macroeconomics. Part of the difficulty lies in that the estimated response is sensitive to the specification of hours in structural vector autoregressions (SVARs). This paper uses a simple two-step approach to consistently estimate the response of hours. The first step considers a SVAR model with a relevant stationary variable, but excluding hours. Given a consistent estimate of technology shocks in the first step, the response of hours to this shock is estimated in a second step. Simulation experiments from an estimated dynamic stochastic general equilibrium (DSGE) model show that this approach outperforms standard SVARs. When applied to U.S. data, the two-step approach predicts a short-run decrease followed by a hump-shaped positive response. This result is robust to other specifications and data.     

Trends and random walks in macroeconmic time series: Some evidence and implications

This paper investigates whether macroeconomic time series are better characterized as stationary fluctuations around a deterministic trend or as non-stationary processes that have no tendency to return to a deterministic path. Using long historical time series for the U.S. we are unable to reject the hypothesis that these series are non-stationary stochastic processes with no tendency to return to a trend line. Based on these findings and an unobserved components model for output that decomposes fluctuations into a secular or growth component and a cyclical component we infer that shocks to the former, which we associate with real disturbances, contribute substantially to the variation in observed output. We conclude that macroeconomic models that focus on monetary disturbances as a source of purely transitory fluctuations may never be successful in explaining a large fraction of output variation and that stochastic variation due to real factors is an essential element of any model of macroeconomic fluctuations.     

The Quantitative Importance of News Shocks in Estimated DSGE Models

We estimate a dynamic stochastic general equilibrium (DSGE) model with several frictions and both unanticipated and news shocks, using quarterly U.S. data from 1954 to 2004 and Bayesian methods. We find that unanticipated shocks dominate news shocks in accounting for the unconditional variance of output, consumption, and investment growth, interest rate, and the relative price of investment. The unanticipated shock to the marginal efficiency of investment is the dominant shock, accounting for over 45% of the variance in output growth. News shocks account for less than 15% of the variance in output growth. Within the set of news shocks, nontechnology sources of news dominate technology news, with wage markup news shocks accounting for about 60% of the variance share of both hours and inflation. We find that in the estimated DSGE model (i) the presence of endogenous countercyclical price and wage markups due to nominal frictions substantially diminishes the importance of news shocks relative to a model without these frictions, and (ii) while there is little change in the estimated contributions of technology news when we restrict wealth effects on labor supply, the contributions of nontechnology news shocks are relatively more sensitive.     

The Time-Varying Response of Hours Worked to a Productivity Shock

This paper revisits the dynamic response of hours worked to a total factor productivity (TFP) shock. I estimate a structural vector autoregression that includes time-varying parameters and stochastic volatility. The estimation produces structural parameters that are consistent with the long-run identification. The impulse response functions of hours worked to a TFP shock are negative on impact and at the business cycle horizons. This is evidence that Galí (1999) would interpret as supporting new Keynesian theory. My results also show that TFP shocks are the dominant source of variation in average labor productivity. Structural changes in the U.S. economy play an important role in the TFP–hours worked relationship.     

异质性劳动力供给、工资粘性与中国经济周期

通过同时引入异质性劳动力供给和工资粘性拓展了包含五类外生冲击的新凯恩斯DSGE模型,在此框架下考察异质性劳动力供给和工资粘性对经济周期的作用及传导机制,并分析两者传播和放大外生冲击作用的异同,研究发现：同时包含异质性劳动力供给和工资粘性的一般均衡模型要明显优于非异质性劳动力供给和无工资粘性模型;异质性劳动力供给和工资粘性均在一定程度上放大了外生冲击对经济波动的影响,在不包含两者的情形下,投资冲击的贡献度变小,技术冲击和政府支出冲击的贡献度变大。     

Long-term changes in labor supply and taxes: Evidence from OECD countries, 1956-2004

We document large differences in trend changes in hours worked across OECD countries between 1956 and 2004. We assess the extent to which these changes are consistent with the intratemporal first order condition from the neoclassical growth model, augmented with taxes on labor income and consumption expenditures. We find that the model can account for most of the trend changes in hours worked measured in the data. Differences in taxes explain much of the variation in hours worked both over time and across countries.     

Consumption heterogeneity,employment dynamics and macroeconomic co-movement

Real-business-cycle models rely on total factor productivity (TFP) shocks to explain the observed co-movement among consumption, investment and hours. However an emerging body of evidence identifies “investment shocks” as important drivers of business cycles. This paper shows that a neoclassical model consistent with observed heterogeneity in labor supply and consumption across employed and non-employed can generate co-movement in response non-TFP shocks. Estimation reveals fluctuations in the marginal efficiency of investment that explain the bulk of business-cycle variance in consumption, investment and hours. A corollary of the model׳s empirical success is the labor wedge that is not important at business-cycle frequencies.     

Incomplete markets, labor supply and capital accumulation

Endogenous labor supply decisions are introduced in an equilibrium model of limited insurance against idiosyncratic shocks. Unlike in the standard case with exogenous labor (e.g. [Aiyagari, S.R., 1994. Uninsured idiosyncratic risk and aggregate saving. Quarterly Journal of Economics 109, 659-684; Huggett, M., 1997. The one-sector growth model with idiosyncratic shocks: steady states and dynamics. Journal of Monetary Economics 39, 385-403]), labor supply is likely to be lower than under complete markets. This is due to an ex post wealth effect on labor supply (rich productive agents work fewer hours) that runs counter the precautionary savings motive. As a result, equilibrium savings and output may be lower under incomplete markets. It is also found that long-run savings remain finite even when the interest rate equals the inverse of the discount factor.     

How important is intra-household risk sharing for savings and labor supply?

While it is recognized that the family is a risk-sharing institution, little is known about the quantitative effects of this source of insurance on savings and labor supply. In this paper, we present a model where workers (females and males) are subject to idiosyncratic employment risk and where capital markets are incomplete. A household is formed by a female and a male, who decide on consumption, savings and labor supplies. In a calibrated version of our model we find that intra-household risk sharing has its largest impact among wealth-poor households. While the wealth-rich use mainly savings to smooth consumption across unemployment spells, wealth-poor households rely on spousal labor supply. For instance, for low-wealth households, average hours worked by wives of unemployed husbands are 8% higher than those worked by wives of employed husbands. This response in wives’ hours makes up 9% of lost family income. We also study consumption losses upon an unemployment spell, precautionary savings and the crowding out effects of the public unemployment insurance program on the extent of risk sharing within the household.     

Can News Be a Major Source of Aggregate Fluctuations? A Bayesian DSGE Approach

We examine whether the news shocks, as explored in Beaudry and Portier (2004) , can be a major source of aggregate fluctuations. For this purpose, we extend a standard dynamic stochastic general equilibrium model of Christiano, Eichenbaum, and Evans (2005) and Smets and Wouters (2003, 2007) by allowing news shocks on the total factor productivity (TFP), and estimate the model using Bayesian methods. Estimation results on the U.S. and Japanese economies suggest that (i) news shocks play a relatively more important role in the United States than in Japan, (ii) a news shock with a longer forecast horizon has larger effects on nominal variables, and (iii) the overall effect of the TFP on hours worked becomes ambiguous in the presence of news shocks.     

Stochastic simulations of time series within Weierstrass–Mandelbrot walks

Abstract

In the present work we extend Lévy walks to allow the velocity of the walker to vary. We call these extended Lévy walks Weierstrass-Mandelbrot walks. This is a generalized model of the Lévy walk type which is still able to describe both stationary and non-stationary stochastic time series by treating the initial step of the walker differently. The model was partly motivated by the properties of financial time series and tested on empirical data extracted from the Warsaw stock exchange since it offers an opportunity to study in an unbiased way several features of the stock exchange in its early stages. We extended the continuous-time random walk formalism but the (generalized) waiting-time distribution (WTD) and sojourn probability density still play a fundamental role. We considered a one-dimensional, non-Brownian random walk where the walker moves, in general, with a velocity that assumes a different constant value between the successive turning points, i.e. the velocity is a piecewise constant function. So far the models which have been developed take only one chosen value of this velocity into account and therefore are unable to consider more realistic stochastic time series. Moreover, our model is a kind of Lévy walk where we assume a hierarchical, self-similar in the stochastic sense, spatio-temporal representation of WTD and sojourn probability density. The Weierstrass-Mandelbrot walk model makes it possible to analyse both the structure of the Hurst exponent and the power-law behaviour of kurtosis. This structure results from the hierarchical, spatio-temporal coupling between the walker displacement and the corresponding time of the walks. The analysis makes use of both the fractional diffusion and the super-Burnett coefficients. We constructed the diffusion phase diagram which distinguishes regions occupied by classes of different universality. We study only such classes which are characteristic of stationary situations. We proved that even after taking a moving averaging of the stochastic time series which makes results stationary in the sense that they are independent of the beginning moment of the random walk, it is still possible to see the non-Gaussian features of the basic stochastic process. We thus have a model ready for describing data presented, e.g., in the form of moving averages. This operation is often used for stochastic time series, especially financial ones. Based on the hierarchical representation of WTD we introduce an efficient Monte Carlo algorithm which makes a numerical simulation of individual runs of stochastic time series possible; this facilitates the study of empirical stochastic time series.     

Children's Working Hours and School Enrollment: Evidence from Pakistan and Nicaragua

Although much of the literature on child labor looks at thedecision on whether to send a child to school or to work (orboth), little attention has focused on the number of hours worked.This article analyzes the determinants of school attendanceand hours worked by children in Pakistan and Nicaragua. A theoreticalmodel of children's labor supply is used to simultaneously estimatethe school attendance decision and the hours worked, using afull model maximum likelihood estimator. The model analyzesthe marginal effects of explanatory variables, conditioningon latent states, that is, the propensity of the household tosend the child to work or not. These marginal effects are insome cases rather different across latent states, with importantpolicy implications.     

Balancing Retirement Security With the Needs of Frail Parents

Abstract

Caring for frail elderly parents can interfere with work responsibilities. People who provide care to their parents may need to take time off from work or retire altogether. However, reductions in labor supply at midlife can have serious implications for retirement wealth and, as a result, on economic well-being in later life. This paper examines how family support for the elderly can affect retirement savings by examining the relationship between labor supply, time help to parents, and financial assistance to parents. Using data from the Health and Retirement Study on a nationally representative sample of women ages 53–63, we found that women who helped their parents with personal care assistance worked significantly fewer hours than did those who did not help their parents, whereas those who provided financial assistance worked significantly more hours. Although few persons at midlife presently spend substantial amounts of time helping their elderly parents in any given year, for those who do, the costs can be high. Pressures on families are likely to mount in the near future as falling mortality and fertility rates continue to increase the proportion of the population that is very old and as women continue to play more important roles in the labor market.     

Methods versus substance: Measuring the effects of technology shocks

Calibration and modern (Bayesian) estimation methods for a neoclassical stochastic growth model are applied to make the case that the identification of key parameters, rather than quantitative methodologies per se, is responsible for empirical findings. For concreteness, the model is used to measure the contributions of technology shocks to the business cycle fluctuations of hours worked and output. Along the way, new insights are provided in the parameter identification associated with likelihood-based estimation, the sensitivity of likelihood-based estimation to the choice of structural shocks is assessed, and Bayesian model averaging is used to aggregate findings obtained from different DSGE model specifications.     

Linear-quadratic term structure models – Toward the understanding of jumps in interest rates

We study linear-quadratic term structure models with random jumps in the short rate process where the jump arrival rate follows a stochastic process. Empirical results based on the US data show that incorporating stochastic jump intensity significantly improves model fit to the dynamics of both interest rate and volatility term structure. Our results also show that jump intensity is negatively correlated with interest rate changes and the average size is larger on the downside than upside. Examining the relation between jump intensity and macroeconomic shocks, we find that at monthly frequency, jumps are neither triggered by nor predictive of changes in macroeconomic variables. At daily frequency, however, we document interesting patterns for jumps associated with information shocks.     

Asset Returns and Labor Supply in a Production Economy

The introduction of an endogenous labor decision represents a challenge for models that seek to jointly explain asset pricing and business cycle facts. This paper shows that several improvements can be made if a standard real business cycle model is augmented with a novel preference specification that increases the stochastic discount factor volatility and simultaneously reduces the wealth elasticity of labor supply.     

Labor-supply shifts and economic fluctuations

We propose a new VAR identification scheme that distinguishes shifts of and movements along the labor demand schedule to identify labor-supply shocks. According to our VAR analysis of post-war US data, labor-supply shifts account for about 30 percent of the variation in hours and about 15 percent of the output fluctuations at business cycle frequencies. To assess the role of labor-supply shifts in a more structural framework, estimates from a dynamic general equilibrium model with stochastic variation in home production technology are compared to those from the VAR.     

Differences in Hours Worked in the OECD: Institutions or Fiscal Policies?

We study the determinants of the level and the evolution of per capita hours worked in a panel of OECD countries since the 1970s. Following Pesaran (2006) , our empirical strategy allows for the possibility of cross‐sectionally correlated error terms due to unobserved common factors, which are potentially nonstationary. We find that much of the variation in per capita hours worked across countries and over time can be explained by differences in the level and structure of taxes and government expenditures. Differences in (the evolution of) labor and product market institutions have much less of a role to play. Our results show that a careful treatment of the time‐series properties of the data is crucial.