Measuring inflation expectations in interwar Britain

What caused the recovery from the British Great Depression? A leading explanation – the ‘expectations channel’ – suggests that a shift in expected inflation lowered real interest rates and stimulated consumption and investment. However, few studies have measured, or tested the economic consequences of, inflation expectations. In this paper, we collect high-frequency information from primary and secondary sources to measure expected inflation in the United Kingdom between the wars. A high-frequency vector autoregression suggests that inflation expectations were an important source of the early stages of economic recovery in interwar Britain.     

Introduction to the special issue on agent-based models in urban economics

Journal of Economic Interaction and Coordination -     

Sampling error and the joint estimation of imputation credit value and cash dividend value

The value of imputation credits can only be estimated jointly with the value of cash dividends. We show that random variation across samples leads to estimates of credit value that move in the opposite direction to estimates of cash value. Derivative prices suggest a value for credits of 0.01 to 0.20 (0.01 to 0.07 if cash is worth 0.94, and 0.13 to 0.20 if cash is worth 0.87). Ex-dividend prices suggest a value for credits of 0.23 to 0.46 (0.23 to 0.36 if cash is worth 0.85, and 0.33 to 0.46 if cash is worth 0.75).     

Exciting,boring, and nonexistent skylines: Vertical building gaps in global perspective

Despite the widespread prevalence and economic importance of tall buildings, little is known about how their patterns vary across space and time. We aim to quantify differences across major world regions over time (1950–2020). To do so, we exploit novel data on the location, height (above 55 m), and year of construction of nearly all tall buildings in the world. We propose a new methodology to estimate the extent to which some world regions build up more than others given similar economic and geographic conditions, city size distributions, and other features. Our analyses reveal that many skylines may visually appear more prominent than they really are once one includes all tall buildings and core controls, which alters how regions are ranked in terms of tall building stocks. Using results by city size, centrality, height of buildings, and building function, we classify world regions into different groups, finding that tall building stocks are likely driven by boring skylines of residential high-rises, and to a lesser extent exciting skylines of skyscrapers and office towers. Finally, land-use regulations and preferences, not historical preservation nor dispersed ownership, may account for most observed differences.     

Dating business cycles in the United Kingdom, 1700–2010

This paper constructs a new chronology of the business cycle in the United Kingdom from 1700 on an annual basis and from 1920 on a quarterly basis to 2010. The new chronology points to several observations about the business cycle. First, the cycle has significantly increased in duration and amplitude over time. Second, contractions have become less frequent but are as persistent and costly as at other times in history. Third, the typical recession has been tick-shaped with a short contraction and longer recovery. Finally, the major causes of downturns have been sectoral shocks, financial crises, and wars.