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Does job insecurity affect household consumption?

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Andrew Benito

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Abstract

This paper confronts implications of precautionary saving models with microdata on British households. The results provide support for the central proposition that job insecurity depresses household consumption levels. A one standard deviation increase in unemployment risk for the head of household is estimated to reduce household consumption by 2.7%. Interpreting the spread of the distribution across workers in job insecurity levels as consisting of four standard deviations, this implies that moving from the bottom to the top of the distribution gives rise to a reduction in consumption of 11%, ceteris paribus. This effect is estimated to be greater for the young, those without non-labour income and manual workers, a pattern also consistent with the predictions of precautionary saving models. The paper then studies the propensity for households to purchase durable goods and finds durables purchases to be delayed significantly by higher unemployment risk. The paper therefore demonstrates that job insecurity affects aggregate demand through both non-durable and durable expenditure, controlling for other influences including estimated permanent income.

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Paper provided by Bank of England in its series Bank of England working papers with number 220.

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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.:
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  3. Caballero, Ricardo J., 1990. "Consumption puzzles and precautionary savings," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 25(1), pages 113-136, January. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  4. Philip Merrigan & Michel Normandin, 1994. "Precautionary Saving Motives: An Assessment from U.K. Time Series of Cross-Sections," Cahiers de recherche CREFE / CREFE Working Papers 29, CREFE, Université du Québec à Montréal.
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  5. Christopher D. Carroll, 2001. "A Theory of the Consumption Function, with and without Liquidity Constraints," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 15(3), pages 23-45, Summer. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  6. Christopher D. Carroll & Karen E. Dynan & Spencer D. Krane, 1999. "Unemployment risk and precautionary wealth: evidence from households' balance sheets," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 1999-15, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.). [Downloadable!]
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  7. Green, Francis & Machin, Stephen & Manning, Alan, 1996. "The Employer Size-Wage Effect: Can Dynamic Monopsony Provide an Explanation?," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 48(3), pages 433-55, July. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  12. Lusardi, Annamaria, 1998. "On the Importance of the Precautionary Saving Motive," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 88(2), pages 449-53, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  33. Dynan, Karen E, 1993. "How Prudent Are Consumers?," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 101(6), pages 1104-13, December. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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Full references

Cited by:
(explanations, 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. Andrew Benito & Haroon Mumtaz, . "Consumption excess sensitivity, liquidity constraints and the collateral role of housing," Bank of England working papers 306, Bank of England. [Downloadable!]
  2. Björn Fischer & Petra Köhler & Franz Seitz, 2004. "The demand for euro area currencies," Working Paper Series 330, European Central Bank. [Downloadable!]
  3. Francis Green, 2008. "Subjective Employment Insecurity Around the World," Studies in Economics 0810, Department of Economics, University of Kent. [Downloadable!]
  4. Andrew Benito, . "Housing equity as a buffer: evidence from UK households," Bank of England working papers 324, Bank of England. [Downloadable!]
  5. Andrew Benito, . "How does the down-payment constraint affect the UK housing market?," Bank of England working papers 294, Bank of England. [Downloadable!]
  6. Clemente De Lucia & Mara Meacci, 2005. "Does job security matter for consumption? An analysis on Italian microdata," ISAE Working Papers 54, ISAE - Institute for Studies and Economic Analyses - (Rome, ITALY). [Downloadable!]
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