| Abstract: | Summary The aim of this paper is to collect disaggregated data on inventories in Austria. This information is used to study the role of inventory investment in business cycles. It seemed especially interesting to investigate whether entrepreneurs plan a stable inventory-sales ratio and whether inventories of purchased goods, goods in production and goods for sale are influenced by the same factors.It turns out that the aggregate inventory-sales ratio (in current prices) decreased considerably during the past twenty years. This decrease was caused only by different rates of price increases; measured in constant prices, the rate remained almost constant. Inventories exhibit a procyclical behavior, with inventory investment leading and inventory stocks lagging.For industry investment in stocks of purchased goods depends on outstanding orders and on imports, for goods in process on orders, production and on stocks of finished goods (positively). eterminants of finished goods inventories are sales and capacity utilisation (positive sign); entrepreneurs therefore increase their stocks in boom phases and decrease them in times of slower demand. This is exactly the behavior which a previous theoretical paper expected: Inventories don't act as a buffer over the cycle, quite the contrary, inventory planning reinforces economic fluctuations. |
