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Household Debt and Income Inequality, 1963-2003

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Author Info
Matteo Iacoviello () (Boston College)

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Abstract

I construct an economy with heterogeneous agents that mimics the time-series behavior of the earnings distribution in the United States from 1963 to 2003. Agents face aggregate and idiosyncratic shocks and accumulate real and financial assets. I estimate the shocks that drive the model using data on income inequality, aggregate income, and measures of financial liberalization. I show how the model economy can replicate two empirical facts: the trend and cyclical behavior of household debt, and the diverging patterns in consumption and wealth inequality over time. While business cycle fluctuations can account for the short-run changes in household debt, its prolonged rise of the 1980s and the 1990s can be quantitatively explained only by the concurrent increase in income inequality.

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Publisher Info
Paper provided by Boston College Department of Economics in its series Boston College Working Papers in Economics with number 629.

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Length: 39 pages
Date of creation: 03 Nov 2005
Date of revision: 18 Oct 2007
Publication status: forthcoming, Journal of Money, Credit and Banking
Handle: RePEc:boc:bocoec:629

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Postal: Boston College, 140 Commonwealth Avenue, Chestnut Hill MA 02467 USA
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Related research
Keywords: Credit constraints; Incomplete Markets; Income Inequality; Household Debt;

Other versions of this item:

Find related papers by JEL classification:
E31 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Price Level; Inflation; Deflation
E32 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Business Fluctuations; Cycles
E44 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Money and Interest Rates - - - Financial Markets and the Macroeconomy
E52 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit - - - Monetary Policy
R21 - Urban, Rural, and Regional Economics - - Household Analysis - - - Housing Demand

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References listed on IDEAS
Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
  1. Thomas Lemieux, 2006. "Increasing Residual Wage Inequality: Composition Effects, Noisy Data, or Rising Demand for Skill?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 96(3), pages 461-498, June. [Downloadable!]
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    Other versions:
  3. Krusell, Per & Kuruscu, Burhanettin & Smith, Anthony Jr., 2002. "Time orientation and asset prices," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 49(1), pages 107-135, January. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  4. Den Haan, Wouter J., 1997. "Solving Dynamic Models With Aggregate Shocks And Heterogeneous Agents," Macroeconomic Dynamics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 1(02), pages 355-386, June. [Downloadable!]
  5. Peter Gottschalk & Robert Moffitt, 1994. "The Growth of Earnings Instability in the U.S. Labor Market," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 25(1994-2), pages 217-272. [Downloadable!]
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  8. Jonathan Heathcote, 2003. "The Macroeconomic Implications of Rising Wage Inequality in the United States," Working Papers gueconwpa~03-03-19, Georgetown University, Department of Economics. [Downloadable!]
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  9. Kjetil Storesletten & Chris I. Telmer & Amir Yaron, 2004. "Cyclical Dynamics in Idiosyncratic Labor Market Risk," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 112(3), pages 695-717, June.
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  11. Alon Brav & George M. Constantinides & Christopher C. Geczy, 2002. "Asset Pricing with Heterogeneous Consumers and Limited Participation: Empirical Evidence," NBER Working Papers 8822, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  12. Jeffrey R. Campbell & Zvi Hercowitz, 2005. "The Role of Collateralized Household Debt in Macroeconomic Stabilization," NBER Working Papers 11330, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  13. Dirk Krueger & Fabrizio Perri, 2003. "On the Welfare Consequences of the Increase in Inequality in the United States," NBER Working Papers 9993, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  14. Marco Cagetti & Mariacristina De Nardi, 2005. "Wealth inequality: data and models," Working Paper Series WP-05-10, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  15. Samwick, Andrew A., 1998. "Discount rate heterogeneity and social security reform," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 57(1), pages 117-146, October. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  16. Robert A. Moffitt & Peter Gottschalk, 2002. "Trends in the Transitory Variance of Earnings in the United States," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 112(478), pages C68-C73, March. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  17. Matteo Iacoviello, 2005. "House Prices, Borrowing Constraints, and Monetary Policy in the Business Cycle," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(3), pages 739-764, June. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  18. Per Krusell & Anthony A. Smith & Jr., 1998. "Income and Wealth Heterogeneity in the Macroeconomy," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 106(5), pages 867-896, October. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  19. Katz, Lawrence F. & Autor, David H., 1999. "Changes in the wage structure and earnings inequality," Handbook of Labor Economics, in: O. Ashenfelter & D. Card (ed.), Handbook of Labor Economics, edition 1, volume 3, chapter 26, pages 1463-1555 Elsevier. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  20. Ana Castaneda & Javier Diaz-Gimenez & Jose-Victor Rios-Rull, 2003. "Accounting for the U.S. Earnings and Wealth Inequality," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 111(4), pages 818-857, August. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  21. Sydney Ludvigson, 1999. "Consumption And Credit: A Model Of Time-Varying Liquidity Constraints," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 81(3), pages 434-447, August. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  22. Heathcote, Jonathan & Storesletten, Kjetil & Violante, Giovanni L, 2004. "The Cross-Sectional Implications of Rising Wage Inequality in the United States," CEPR Discussion Papers 4296, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  23. repec:fth:harver:1435 is not listed on IDEAS
  24. David Card & John E. DiNardo, 2002. "Skill-Biased Technological Change and Rising Wage Inequality: Some Problems and Puzzles," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 20(4), pages 733-783, October. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  25. Zhang, Harold H, 1997. " Endogenous Borrowing Constraints with Incomplete Markets," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 52(5), pages 2187-2209, December. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  26. Markus Christen & Ruskin Morgan, 2005. "Keeping Up With the Joneses: Analyzing the Effect of Income Inequality on Consumer Borrowing," Quantitative Marketing and Economics, Springer, vol. 3(2), pages 145-173, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  27. repec:cup:macdyn:v:1:y:1997:i:2:p:355-86 is not listed on IDEAS
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