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Idiosyncratic risk and aggregate employment dynamics

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Author Info
Jeffrey R. Campbell
Jonas D.M. Fisher

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Abstract

This paper studies how producers’ idiosyncratic risks affect an industry’s aggregate dynamics in an environment where certainty equivalence fails. In the model, producers can place workers in two types of jobs, organized and temporary. Workers are less productive in temporary jobs, but creating an organized job requires an irreversible investment of managerial resources. Increasing productivity risk raises the value of an unexercised option to create an organized job. Losing this option is one cost of immediate organized job creation, so an increase in its value induces substitution towards cheaper temporary jobs. Because they are costless to create and destroy, a producer using temporary jobs can be more flexible, responding more to both idiosyncratic and aggregate shocks. If all of an industry’s producers adapt to heightened idiosyncratic risk in this way, the industry as a whole can respond more to a given aggregate shock. This insight is used to better understand the observation from the U.S. manufacturing sector that groups of plants displaying high idiosyncratic variability also have large aggregate fluctuations.

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Paper provided by Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago in its series Working Paper Series with number WP-00-15.

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Date of creation: 2000
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Handle: RePEc:fip:fedhwp:wp-00-15

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Keywords: Employment (Economic theory) ; Temporary employees;

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This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports: References listed on IDEAS
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  2. Julia K. Thomas, 2002. "Is Lumpy Investment Relevant for the Business Cycle?," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 110(3), pages 508-534, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  3. Christopher L. Foote, 1998. "Trend Employment Growth And The Bunching Of Job Creation And Destruction," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 113(3), pages 809-834, August. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  4. Steve J. Davis & John Haltiwanger, 1991. "Gross Job Creation, Gross Job Destruction and Employment Reallocation," NBER Working Papers 3728, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  6. John Y. Campbell, 2001. "Have Individual Stocks Become More Volatile? An Empirical Exploration of Idiosyncratic Risk," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 56(1), pages 1-43, 02. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  7. Susan Athey & Armin Schmutzler, 1995. "Product and Process Flexibility in an Innovative Environment," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 26(4), pages 557-574, Winter. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  9. Kashyap, Anil K & Lamont, Owen A & Stein, Jeremy C, 1994. "Credit Conditions and the Cyclical Behavior of Inventories," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 109(3), pages 565-92, August. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  10. Steven J. Davis & John Haltiwanger, 1999. "On the Driving Forces behind Cyclical Movements in Employment and Job Reallocation," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 89(5), pages 1234-1258, December. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  11. Mark Gertler & Simon Gilchrist, 1991. "Monetary Policy, Business Cycles and the Behavior of Small Manufacturing Firms," NBER Working Papers 3892, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  13. Jeffrey R. Campbell & Jonas D. M. Fisher, 2000. "Aggregate Employment Fluctuations with Microeconomic Asymmetries," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 90(5), pages 1323-1345, December. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  14. Jovanovic, Boyan, 1982. "Selection and the Evolution of Industry," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 50(3), pages 649-70, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  15. Cabrales, Antonio & Hopenhayn, Hugo A., 1997. "Labor-market flexibility and aggregate employment volatility," Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 46(1), pages 189-228, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  18. Lars Ljungqvist & Thomas J. Sargent, 1998. "The European Unemployment Dilemma," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 106(3), pages 514-550, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  19. Steven J. Davis & John C. Haltiwanger & Scott Schuh, 1998. "Job Creation and Destruction," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262540932, January.
  20. Marcelo L. Veracierto, 2002. "Plant-Level Irreversible Investment and Equilibrium Business Cycles," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 92(1), pages 181-197, March. [Downloadable!]
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  21. Caballero, Ricardo J & Engel, Eduardo M R A & Haltiwanger, John, 1997. "Aggregate Employment Dynamics: Building from Microeconomic Evidence," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 87(1), pages 115-37, March. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  22. Dunne, Timothy & Roberts, Mark J & Samuelson, Larry, 1989. "The Growth and Failure of U.S. Manufacturing Plants," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 104(4), pages 671-98, November. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  23. Victor Aguirregabiria & Cesar Alonso-Borrego, 2009. "Labor Contracts and Flexibility: Evidence from a Labor Market Reform in Spain," Working Papers tecipa-346, University of Toronto, Department of Economics. [Downloadable!]
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  24. Comin, D., 2000. "An Uncertainty-Driven Theory of the Productivity Slowdown: Manufacturing," Working Papers 00-16, C.V. Starr Center for Applied Economics, New York University. [Downloadable!]
  25. Jeffrey R. Campbell & Jonas D.M. Fisher, 1998. "Organizational flexibility and employment dynamics at young and old plants," Working Paper Series WP-98-24, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago. [Downloadable!]
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  26. Jones, Robert A & Ostroy, Joseph M, 1984. "Flexibility and Uncertainty," Review of Economic Studies, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 51(1), pages 13-32, January. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  27. Hamermesh, Daniel S. & Hassink, Wolter H.J. & Ours, Jan C. van, 1994. "Job turnover and labor turnover : a taxonomy of employment dynamics," Serie Research Memoranda 0050, VU University Amsterdam, Faculty of Economics, Business Administration and Econometrics. [Downloadable!]
  28. Daniel S. Hamermesh & Gerard A. Pfann, 1996. "Adjustment Costs in Factor Demand," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 34(3), pages 1264-1292, September. [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. Min Ouyang, 2005. "The Scarring Effect of Recessions," Working Papers 050609, University of California-Irvine, Department of Economics. [Downloadable!]
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  2. Øivind A. Nilsen, Arvid Raknerud, Marina Rybalka and Terje Skjerpen, 2005. "Lumpy Investments, Factor Adjustments and Productivity," Discussion Papers 441, Research Department of Statistics Norway. [Downloadable!]
  3. Min Ouyang, 2006. "Plant Life Cycle and Aggregate Employment Dynamics," Working Papers 050632, University of California-Irvine, Department of Economics. [Downloadable!]
  4. Eugenio P. Pinto, 2009. "Firms' relative sensitivity to aggregate shocks and the dynamics of gross job flows," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2009-02, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.). [Downloadable!]
  5. 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:
  6. Simon Gilchrist & John C. Williams, 2005. "Investment, Capacity, and Uncertainty: A Putty-Clay Approach," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 8(1), pages 1-27, January. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
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