IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/ecinqu/v60y2022i2p954-974.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Inflation expectations and consumption: Evidence from 1951

Author

Listed:
  • Carola Conces Binder
  • Gillian Brunet

Abstract

We use rich microdata from the 1951 Survey of Consumer Finances to study inflation expectations and consumption during the Korean War, in an episode when monetary policy was constrained. We provide the first detailed analysis of consumer inflation expectations from that era. Using survey measures of actual and expected spending on durables, cars, and homes at extensive and intensive margins, we show that the difference between consumption in 1950 and expected consumption in 1951 increases with expected inflation. Effect sizes are modest, even though household balance sheets were healthy and inflation was salient.

Suggested Citation

  • Carola Conces Binder & Gillian Brunet, 2022. "Inflation expectations and consumption: Evidence from 1951," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 60(2), pages 954-974, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:ecinqu:v:60:y:2022:i:2:p:954-974
    DOI: 10.1111/ecin.13051
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/ecin.13051
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/ecin.13051?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Hibiki Ichiue & Shusaku Nishiguchi, 2015. "Inflation Expectations And Consumer Spending At The Zero Bound: Micro Evidence," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 53(2), pages 1086-1107, April.
    2. John Carter Braxton & Willem Van Zandweghe, 2013. "Has durable goods spending become less sensitive to interest rates?," Economic Review, Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, issue Q IV, pages 5-27.
    3. Dupor, Bill & Guerrero, Rodrigo, 2017. "Local and aggregate fiscal policy multipliers," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 92(C), pages 16-30.
    4. Francesco D’Acunto & Daniel Hoang & Maritta Paloviita & Michael Weber, 2023. "IQ, Expectations, and Choice," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 90(5), pages 2292-2325.
    5. Mary A. Burke & Ali Ozdagli, 2023. "Household Inflation Expectations and Consumer Spending: Evidence from Panel Data," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 105(4), pages 948-961, July.
    6. Coibion, Olivier & Georgarakos, Dimitris & Gorodnichenko, Yuriy & van Rooij, Maarten, 2019. "How Does Consumption Respond to News about Inflation? Field Evidence from a Randomized Control Trial," Department of Economics, Working Paper Series qt3zh865pj, Department of Economics, Institute for Business and Economic Research, UC Berkeley.
    7. Romer, Christina D., 1992. "What Ended the Great Depression?," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 52(4), pages 757-784, December.
    8. Coibion, Olivier & Gorodnichenko, Yuriy & Kumar, Saten & Pedemonte, Mathieu, 2020. "Inflation expectations as a policy tool?," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 124(C).
    9. Ulrike Malmendier & Stefan Nagel, 2016. "Learning from Inflation Experiences," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 131(1), pages 53-87.
    10. repec:ces:ifodic:v:15:y:2017:i:1:p:19307480 is not listed on IDEAS
    11. Lena Dräger & Giang Nghiem, 2021. "Are Consumers' Spending Decisions in Line with A Euler Equation?," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 103(3), pages 580-596, July.
    12. repec:zbw:bofrdp:2019_002 is not listed on IDEAS
    13. Roberto Perotti, 2014. "Defense Government Spending Is Contractionary, Civilian Government Spending Is Expansionary," NBER Working Papers 20179, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    14. Robert L. Hetzel & Ralph F. Leach, 2001. "The Treasury-Fed Accord : a new narrative account," Economic Quarterly, Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond, issue Win, pages 33-55.
    15. Gauti B. Eggertsson, 2008. "Great Expectations and the End of the Depression," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 98(4), pages 1476-1516, September.
    16. Rüdiger Bachmann & Tim O. Berg & Eric R. Sims, 2015. "Inflation Expectations and Readiness to Spend: Cross-Sectional Evidence," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 7(1), pages 1-35, February.
    17. Binder, Carola Conces, 2016. "Estimation of historical inflation expectations," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 1-31.
    18. Francesco D'Acunto & Daniel Hoang & Michael Weber, 2018. "Unconventional Fiscal Policy," AEA Papers and Proceedings, American Economic Association, vol. 108, pages 519-523, May.
    19. Holston, Kathryn & Laubach, Thomas & Williams, John C., 2017. "Measuring the natural rate of interest: International trends and determinants," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 108(S1), pages 59-75.
    20. Saul B. Klaman, 1961. "The Postwar Pattern of Mortgage Interest Rates," NBER Chapters, in: The Postwar Residential Mortgage Market, pages 74-98, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    21. Francesco D’Acunto & Daniel Hoang & Michael Weber, 2017. "The Effect of Unconventional Fiscal Policy on Consumption Expenditure," ifo DICE Report, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, vol. 15(01), pages 09-11, April.
    22. Binder, Carola Conces, 2015. "Whose expectations augment the Phillips curve?," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 136(C), pages 35-38.
    23. Saul B. Klaman, 1961. "The Postwar Residential Mortgage Market," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number klam61-1, March.
    24. Robert E. Hall, 2009. "By How Much Does GDP Rise If the Government Buys More Output?," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 40(2 (Fall)), pages 183-249.
    25. Binder, Carola, 2017. "Fed speak on main street: Central bank communication and household expectations," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 52(C), pages 238-251.
    26. Saul B. Klaman, 1961. "The Mortgage Market," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 16(2), pages 255-260, May.
    27. Marc F. Bellemare & Casey J. Wichman, 2020. "Elasticities and the Inverse Hyperbolic Sine Transformation," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 82(1), pages 50-61, February.
    28. Rockoff, Hugh, 1981. "Price and Wage Controls in Four Wartime Periods," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 41(2), pages 381-401, June.
    29. Alberto Cavallo & Guillermo Cruces & Ricardo Perez-Truglia, 2017. "Inflation Expectations, Learning, and Supermarket Prices: Evidence from Survey Experiments," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 9(3), pages 1-35, July.
    30. Milton Friedman & Anna J. Schwartz, 1963. "A Monetary History of the United States, 1867–1960," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number frie63-1, March.
    31. Duca, Ioana A. & Kenny, Geoff & Reuter, Andreas, 2018. "Inflation expectations, consumption and the lower bound: micro evidence from a large euro area survey," Working Paper Series 2196, European Central Bank.
    32. Carola Binder, 2018. "Interest Rate Prominence In Consumer Decision‐Making," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 56(2), pages 875-894, April.
    33. Francesco D’Acunto & Daniel Hoang & Michael Weber, 2017. "The Effect of Unconventional Fiscal Policy on Consumption Expenditure," ifo DICE Report, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, vol. 15(1), pages 09-11, 04.
    34. Jalil, Andrew J. & Rua, Gisela, 2016. "Inflation expectations and recovery in spring 1933," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 62(C), pages 26-50.
    35. Olivier Coibion & Yuriy Gorodnichenko, 2015. "Inflation Expectations in Ukraine: A Long Path to Anchoring?," Visnyk of the National Bank of Ukraine, National Bank of Ukraine, issue 233, pages 6-23.
    36. Michael F. Bryan & Guhan Venkatu, 2001. "The demographics of inflation opinion surveys," Economic Commentary, Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, issue Oct.
    37. Daniel, Volker & Steege, Lucas ter, 2020. "Inflation expectations and the recovery from the Great Depression in Germany," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 75(C).
    38. Olivier Coibion & Dimitris Georgarakos & Yuriy Gorodnichenko & Maarten van Rooij, 2023. "How Does Consumption Respond to News about Inflation? Field Evidence from a Randomized Control Trial," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 15(3), pages 109-152, July.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Andrade, Philippe & Gautier, Erwan & Mengus, Eric, 2023. "What matters in households’ inflation expectations?," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 138(C), pages 50-68.
    2. Joshua K. Hausman, 2023. "I Am Still Worried About Inflation," Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 42(1), pages 319-322, January.
    3. An, Zidong & Binder, Carola & Sheng, Xuguang Simon, 2023. "Gas price expectations of Chinese households," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 120(C).
    4. Carola Binder & Rupal Kamdar, 2022. "Expected and Realized Inflation in Historical Perspective," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 36(3), pages 131-156, Summer.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Coibion, Olivier & Gorodnichenko, Yuriy & Kumar, Saten & Pedemonte, Mathieu, 2020. "Inflation expectations as a policy tool?," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 124(C).
    2. Bernardo Candia & Olivier Coibion & Yuriy Gorodnichenko, 2020. "Communication and the Beliefs of Economic Agents," NBER Working Papers 27800, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Andrade, Philippe & Gautier, Erwan & Mengus, Eric, 2023. "What matters in households’ inflation expectations?," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 138(C), pages 50-68.
    4. Mary A. Burke & Ali Ozdagli, 2023. "Household Inflation Expectations and Consumer Spending: Evidence from Panel Data," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 105(4), pages 948-961, July.
    5. Goldfayn-Frank, Olga & Wohlfart, Johannes, 2020. "Expectation formation in a new environment: Evidence from the German reunification," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 115(C), pages 301-320.
    6. Duca-Radu, Ioana & Kenny, Geoff & Reuter, Andreas, 2021. "Inflation expectations, consumption and the lower bound: Micro evidence from a large multi-country survey," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 118(C), pages 120-134.
    7. Dräger, Lena & Lamla, Michael J. & Pfajfar, Damjan, 2020. "The Hidden Heterogeneity of Inflation and Interest Rate Expectations: The Role of Preferences," Hannover Economic Papers (HEP) dp-666, Leibniz Universität Hannover, Wirtschaftswissenschaftliche Fakultät, revised Feb 2023.
    8. Francesco D’Acunto & Daniel Hoang & Michael Weber, 2022. "Managing Households’ Expectations with Unconventional Policies," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 35(4), pages 1597-1642.
    9. Lena Dräger & Michael J. Lamla & Damjan Pfajfar, 2020. "The Hidden Heterogeneity of Inflation Expectations and its Implications," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2020-054, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    10. Yuriy Gorodnichenko & Dmitriy Sergeyev, 2021. "Zero Lower Bound on Inflation Expectations," NBER Working Papers 29496, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    11. Michael Weber & Yuriy Gorodnichenko & Olivier Coibion, 2023. "The Expected, Perceived, and Realized Inflation of US Households Before and During the COVID19 Pandemic," IMF Economic Review, Palgrave Macmillan;International Monetary Fund, vol. 71(1), pages 326-368, March.
    12. Carola Binder, 2021. "Presidential antagonism and central bank credibility," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 33(2), pages 244-263, July.
    13. Duca, Ioana A. & Kenny, Geoff & Reuter, Andreas, 2018. "Inflation expectations, consumption and the lower bound: micro evidence from a large euro area survey," Working Paper Series 2196, European Central Bank.
    14. Ryngaert, Jane M., 2022. "Inflation disasters and consumption," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 129(S), pages 67-81.
    15. Hills, Timothy S. & Nakata, Taisuke & Schmidt, Sebastian, 2019. "Effective lower bound risk," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 120(C).
    16. Francesco D'Acunto & Daniel Hoang & Michael Weber & Michael Weber, 2019. "Managing Households' Expectations with Salient Economic Policies," CESifo Working Paper Series 7793, CESifo.
    17. Gabriele Galati & Richhild Moessner & Maarten van Rooij, 2023. "The anchoring of long-term inflation expectations of consumers: insights from a new survey," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 75(1), pages 96-116.
    18. Conrad, Christian & Enders, Zeno & Glas, Alexander, 2022. "The role of information and experience for households’ inflation expectations," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 143(C).
    19. Adriana Grasso & Tiziano Ropele, 2018. "Firms’ inflation expectations and investment plans," Temi di discussione (Economic working papers) 1203, Bank of Italy, Economic Research and International Relations Area.
    20. Cecion, Martina & Coenen, Günter & Gerke, Rafael & Le Bihan, Hervé & Motto, Roberto & Aguilar, Pablo & Ajevskis, Viktors & Giesen, Sebastian & Albertazzi, Ugo & Gilbert, Niels & Al-Haschimi, Alexander, 2021. "The ECB’s price stability framework: past experience, and current and future challenges," Occasional Paper Series 269, European Central Bank.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:ecinqu:v:60:y:2022:i:2:p:954-974. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/weaaaea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.