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The (Mythical?) Housing Wealth Effect

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Author Info
Charles Calomiris
Stanley D. Longhofer
William Miles

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Abstract

Models used to guide policy, as well as some empirical studies, suggest that the effect of housing wealth on consumption is large and greater than the wealth effect on consumption from stock holdings. Recent theoretical work, in contrast, argues that changes in housing wealth are offset by changes in housing consumption, meaning that unexpected shocks in housing wealth should have little effect on non-housing consumption. We reexamine the impact of housing wealth on non-housing consumption, employing the Case-Quigley-Shiller data on U.S. housing wealth that have been used in prior studies to estimate a large housing wealth effect. Existing empirical work fails to control for the fact that changes in housing wealth may be correlated with changes in expected permanent income, biasing the resulting estimates. Once we control for the endogeneity bias resulting from the correlation between housing wealth and permanent income, we find that housing wealth has a small and insignificant effect on consumption. Additional analysis of time-series results provides further support for that view.

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Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Working Papers with number 15075.

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Date of creation: Jun 2009
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Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:15075

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Find related papers by JEL classification:
E21 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Macroeconomics: Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Consumption; Saving; Wealth
E32 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Business Fluctuations; Cycles
R21 - Urban, Rural, and Regional Economics - - Household Analysis - - - Housing Demand
R31 - Urban, Rural, and Regional Economics - - Production Analysis and Firm Location - - - Housing Supply and Markets

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  1. Orazio P. Attanasio & Laura Blow & Robert Hamilton & Andrew Leicester, 2009. "Booms and Busts: Consumption, House Prices and Expectations," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 76(301), pages 20-50, 02. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  2. Frederic S. Mishkin, 2007. "Housing and the Monetary Transmission Mechanism," NBER Working Papers 13518, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  3. Campbell, John Y & Mankiw, N Gregory, 1990. "Permanent Income, Current Income, and Consumption," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 8(3), pages 265-79, July.
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  4. Karl E. Case & John M. Quigley & Robert J. Shiller, 2005. "Comparing Wealth Effects: The Stock Market versus the Housing Market," The B.E. Journal of Macroeconomics, Berkeley Electronic Press, vol. 0(1). [Downloadable!]
  5. Levin, Laurence, 1998. "Are assets fungible?: Testing the behavioral theory of life-cycle savings," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 36(1), pages 59-83, July. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  6. Christopher D. Carroll & Misuzu Otsuka & Jirka Slacalek, 2006. "How Large Is the Housing Wealth Effect? A New Approach," NBER Working Papers 12746, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  7. Muellbauer, John, 2008. "Housing, Credit and Consumer Expenditure," CEPR Discussion Papers 6782, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  8. James M. Poterba, 2000. "Stock Market Wealth and Consumption," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 14(2), pages 99-118, Spring. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  9. Gauger, Jean & Snyder, Tricia Coxwell, 2003. "Residential Fixed Investment and the Macroeconomy: Has Deregulation Altered Key Relationships?," The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, Springer, vol. 27(3), pages 335-54, November. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  10. Sydney Ludvigson & Charles Steindel, 1999. "How important is the stock market effect on consumption?," Economic Policy Review, Federal Reserve Bank of New York, issue Jul, pages 29-51. [Downloadable!]
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  11. Willem H. Buiter, 2008. "Housing Wealth Isn't Wealth," NBER Working Papers 14204, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  12. Richard K. Green, 1997. "Follow the Leader: How Changes in Residential and Non-residential Investment Predict Changes in GDP," Real Estate Economics, American Real Estate and Urban Economics Association, vol. 25(2), pages 253-270. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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