Advanced Search
MyIDEAS: Login

Policy Risk and the Business Cycle

Contents:

Author Info

  • Benjamin Born
  • Johannes Pfeifer

Abstract

The argument that policy risk, i.e. uncertainty about monetary and fiscal policy, has been holding back the economic recovery in the U.S. during the Great Recession has a large popular appeal. We analyze the role of policy risk in explaining business cycle fluctuations by using an estimated New Keynesian model featuring policy risk as well as uncertainty about technology. We directly measure uncertainty from aggregate time series using Sequential Monte Carlo Methods. While we find considerable evidence of policy risk in the data, we show that the "pure uncertainty"-effect of policy risk is unlikely to play a major role in business cycle fluctuations. With the estimated model, output effects are relatively small due to i) dampening general equilibrium effects that imply a low amplification and ii) counteracting partial effects of uncertainty. Finally, we show that policy risk has effects that are an order of magnitude larger than the ones of uncertainty about aggregate TFP.

Download Info

If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the proper application to view it first. In case of further problems read the IDEAS help page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
File URL: http://www.wiwi.uni-bonn.de/bgsepapers/bonedp/bgse06_2011.pdf
Download Restriction: no

Bibliographic Info

Paper provided by University of Bonn, Germany in its series Bonn Econ Discussion Papers with number bgse06_2011.

as in new window
Length: 56
Date of creation: Jun 2011
Date of revision:
Handle: RePEc:bon:bonedp:bgse06_2011

Contact details of provider:
Postal: Bonn Graduate School of Economics, University of Bonn, Adenauerallee 24 - 26, 53113 Bonn, Germany
Fax: +49 228 73 6884
Web page: http://www.bgse.uni-bonn.de/index.php?id=494

Related research

Keywords: Policy Risk; Uncertainty; Aggregate Fluctuations; Particle Filter; General Equilibrium.;

Find related papers by JEL classification:

This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

References

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.:
as in new window
  1. Alejandro Justiniano & Giorgio E. Primiceri & Andrea Tambalotti, 2008. "Investment shocks and business cycles," Working Paper Series WP-08-12, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago.
  2. Nicholas Bloom & Max Floetotto & Nir Jaimovich & Itay Saporta-Eksten & Stephen Terry, 2013. "Really Uncertain Business Cycles," CEP Discussion Papers dp1195, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
  3. Fernández-Villaverde, Jesús & Guerron-Quintana, Pablo A. & Kuester, Keith & Rubio-Ramírez, Juan Francisco, 2011. "Fiscal Volatility Shocks and Economic Activity," CEPR Discussion Papers 8528, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
  4. Jesus Fernandez-Villaverde & Juan F. Rubio-Ramirez, 2006. "Estimating Macroeconomic Models: A Likelihood Approach," NBER Technical Working Papers 0321, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  5. Janice Eberly & Sergio Rebelo & Nicolas Vincent, 2008. "Investment and Value: A Neoclassical Benchmark," Cahiers de recherche 08-03, HEC Montréal, Institut d'économie appliquée.
  6. Leeper, Eric M. & Plante, Michael & Traum, Nora, 2010. "Dynamics of fiscal financing in the United States," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 156(2), pages 304-321, June.
  7. Giorgio E. Primiceri, 2005. "Time Varying Structural Vector Autoregressions and Monetary Policy," Review of Economic Studies, Oxford University Press, vol. 72(3), pages 821-852.
  8. Jon Cohen & Michelle Alexopoulos, 2009. "Uncertain Times, Uncertain Measures," 2009 Meeting Papers 1211, Society for Economic Dynamics.
  9. Martin Møller Andreasen, 2008. "How to Maximize the Likelihood Function for a DSGE Model," CREATES Research Papers 2008-32, School of Economics and Management, University of Aarhus.
  10. Lawrence J. Christiano & Mathias Trabandt & Karl Walentin, 2010. "Introducing financial frictions and unemployment into a small open economy model," CQER Working Paper 2010-04, Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta.
  11. Karel Mertens & Morten O. Ravn, 2009. "Empirical evidence on the aggregate effects of anticipated and unanticipated US tax policy shocks," Working Paper Research 181, National Bank of Belgium.
  12. Beaudry, Paul & Portier, Franck, 2003. "Stock Prices, News and Economic Fluctuations," IDEI Working Papers 158, Institut d'Économie Industrielle (IDEI), Toulouse.
  13. Andrew B. Abel & Avinash K. Dixit & Janice B. Eberly & Robert S. Pindyck, . "Options, the Value of Capital, and Investment," Rodney L. White Center for Financial Research Working Papers 15-95, Wharton School Rodney L. White Center for Financial Research.
  14. John Bailey Jones, 1999. "Has Fiscal Policy Helped Stabilize the Postwar U.S. Economy?," Discussion Papers 99-03, University at Albany, SUNY, Department of Economics.
  15. Carlos Garcia & Jorge Restrepo & Evan Tanner, 2007. "Designing fiscal rules for commodity exporters," ILADES-Georgetown University Working Papers inv199, Ilades-Georgetown University, Universidad Alberto Hurtado/School of Economics and Bussines.
  16. Javier García-Cicco & Roberto Pancrazi & Martín Uribe, 2006. "Real Business Cycles in Emerging Countries?," NBER Working Papers 12629, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  17. Alejandro Justiniano & Giorgio E. Primiceri, 2006. "The Time Varying Volatility of Macroeconomic Fluctuations," NBER Working Papers 12022, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  18. Greenwood, Jeremy & Hercowitz, Zvi & Huffman, Gregory W, 1988. "Investment, Capacity Utilization, and the Real Business Cycle," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 78(3), pages 402-17, June.
  19. Jesus Fernández-Villaverde & Pablo Guerrón-Quintana & Juan F. Rubio-Ramírez, 2010. "Fortune or virtue: time-variant volatilities versus parameter drifting," Working Papers 10-14, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia.
  20. Smets, Frank & Wouters, Rafael, 2007. "Shocks and Frictions in US Business Cycles: A Bayesian DSGE Approach," CEPR Discussion Papers 6112, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
  21. Paul Beaudry & Bernd Lucke, 2010. "Letting Different Views about Business Cycles Compete," NBER Chapters, in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 2009, Volume 24, pages 413-455 National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  22. RUGE-MURCIA, Francisco J., 2010. "Estimating Nonlinear DSGE Models by the Simulated Method of Moments," Cahiers de recherche 2010-10, Universite de Montreal, Departement de sciences economiques.
  23. Ruediger Bachmann & Steffen Elstner & Eric R. Sims, 2010. "Uncertainty and Economic Activity: Evidence from Business Survey Data," NBER Working Papers 16143, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  24. Bekaert, Geert & Hoerova, Marie & Lo Duca, Marco, 2010. "Risk, Uncertainty and Monetary Policy," CEPR Discussion Papers 8154, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
  25. Greenwood, J. & Hercowitz, Z. & Krusell, P., 1996. "Long-Run Implications of Investment-Specific Technological Change," RCER Working Papers 420, University of Rochester - Center for Economic Research (RCER).
  26. Nicholas Bloom, 2007. "The Impact of Uncertainty Shocks," NBER Working Papers 13385, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  27. Jinill Kim & Sunghyun Kim & Ernst Schaumburg & Christopher A. Sims, 2003. "Calculating and Using Second Order Accurate Solutions of Discrete Time," Levine's Bibliography 666156000000000284, UCLA Department of Economics.
  28. Adina Popescu & Frank Rafael Smets, 2010. "Uncertainty, Risk-taking, and the Business Cycle in Germany," CESifo Economic Studies, CESifo, vol. 56(4), pages 596-626, December.
  29. Rüdiger Bachmann & Christian Bayer, 2011. "Uncertainty Business Cycles - Really?," NBER Working Papers 16862, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  30. Susan Yang, Shu-Chun, 2005. "Quantifying tax effects under policy foresight," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 52(8), pages 1557-1568, November.
  31. Chib, Siddhartha & Ramamurthy, Srikanth, 2010. "Tailored randomized block MCMC methods with application to DSGE models," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 155(1), pages 19-38, March.
  32. Rudebusch, Glenn D., 1995. "Federal Reserve interest rate targeting, rational expectations, and the term structure," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 35(2), pages 245-274, April.
  33. Yun, Tack, 1996. "Nominal price rigidity, money supply endogeneity, and business cycles," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 37(2-3), pages 345-370, April.
  34. Koenker, Roger, 1981. "A note on studentizing a test for heteroscedasticity," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 17(1), pages 107-112, September.
  35. Wooldridge, Jeffrey M., 1990. "A Unified Approach to Robust, Regression-Based Specification Tests," Econometric Theory, Cambridge University Press, vol. 6(01), pages 17-43, March.
  36. Breusch, T S & Pagan, A R, 1979. "A Simple Test for Heteroscedasticity and Random Coefficient Variation," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 47(5), pages 1287-94, September.
  37. King, Robert G. & Plosser, Charles I. & Rebelo, Sergio T., 1988. "Production, growth and business cycles : I. The basic neoclassical model," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 21(2-3), pages 195-232.
Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

Citations

Blog mentions

As found by EconAcademics.org, the blog aggregator for Economics research:
  1. Policy risk and the business cycle
    by Economic Logician in Economic Logic on 2011-08-01 14:16:00
Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
as in new window

Cited by:
  1. Fernández-Villaverde, Jesús & Guerron-Quintana, Pablo A. & Kuester, Keith & Rubio-Ramírez, Juan Francisco, 2011. "Fiscal Volatility Shocks and Economic Activity," CEPR Discussion Papers 8528, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
  2. Paul Viefers, 2013. "Wenn sich Warten lohnt: Der Effekt von Unsicherheit auf Investitionsentscheidungen," DIW Wochenbericht, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research, vol. 80(4), pages 11-16.
  3. Michael Plante & Nora Traum, 2012. "Time-Varying Oil Price Volatility and Macroeconomic Aggregates," Caepr Working Papers 2012-002, Center for Applied Economics and Policy Research, Economics Department, Indiana University Bloomington.
  4. Boysen-Hogrefe, Jens & Gern, Klaus-Jürgen & Jannsen, Nils & Plödt, Martin & van Roye, Björn & Scheide, Joachim & Groll, Dominik & Kooths, Stefan, 2012. "Weltkonjunktur und deutsche Konjunktur im Winter 2012," Kiel Discussion Papers 514/515, Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW).
  5. Benjamin Born & Alexandra Peter & Johannes Pfeifer, 2011. "Fiscal News and Macroeconomic Volatility," Bonn Econ Discussion Papers bgse08_2011, University of Bonn, Germany.

Lists

This item is featured on the following reading lists or Wikipedia pages:
  1. Economic Logic blog

Statistics

Access and download statistics

Corrections

When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bon:bonedp:bgse06_2011

For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (BGSE Office).

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 references are entirely missing, you can add them using this form.

If the full references list an item that is present in RePEc, but the system did not link 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 profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

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