IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/asieco/v79y2022ics1049007821001640.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Economic policy uncertainty and household consumption: Evidence from Chinese households

Author

Listed:
  • Wu, Weixing
  • Zhao, Jing

Abstract

We find that households reduce their consumption in response to higher economic policy uncertainty (EPU). Compared with lower income households, high income group is more severely affected which can be explained by the portfolio choice of illiquid asset and liquid asset. In addition, the uncertainty effect is more pronounced among older, wealthier, well-educated and urban households. The impact of EPU on household consumption is also persistent. Holding more liquid asset and commercial insurance represent important channels in mitigating the negative effect of EPU on household consumption.

Suggested Citation

  • Wu, Weixing & Zhao, Jing, 2022. "Economic policy uncertainty and household consumption: Evidence from Chinese households," Journal of Asian Economics, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:asieco:v:79:y:2022:i:c:s1049007821001640
    DOI: 10.1016/j.asieco.2021.101436
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1049007821001640
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.asieco.2021.101436?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Scott R Baker & Robert A Farrokhnia & Steffen Meyer & Michaela Pagel & Constantine Yannelis & Jeffrey Pontiff, 0. "How Does Household Spending Respond to an Epidemic? Consumption during the 2020 COVID-19 Pandemic," The Review of Asset Pricing Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 10(4), pages 834-862.
    2. Duong, Huu Nhan & Nguyen, Justin Hung & Nguyen, My & Rhee, S. Ghon, 2020. "Navigating through economic policy uncertainty: The role of corporate cash holdings," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 62(C).
    3. Veronesi, Pietro, 2019. "Heterogeneous Households under Uncertainty," CEPR Discussion Papers 13466, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    4. Dimitris Christelis & Dimitris Georgarakos & Tullio Jappelli & Maarten van Rooij, 2020. "Consumption Uncertainty and Precautionary Saving," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 102(1), pages 148-161, March.
    5. Sabatini, Fabio, 2008. "Does Social Capital Mitigate Precariousness?," Knowledge, Technology, Human Capital Working Papers 6358, Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei (FEEM).
    6. David M. Cutler & Amy Finkelstein & Kathleen McGarry, 2008. "Preference Heterogeneity and Insurance Markets: Explaining a Puzzle of Insurance," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 98(2), pages 157-162, May.
    7. William B. Peterman & Kamila Sommer, 2019. "How Well Did Social Security Mitigate The Effects Of The Great Recession?," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 60(3), pages 1433-1466, August.
    8. Wang, Yong & Ge, Yanxia, 2018. "The effect of family property income on labor supply: Evidence from China," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 57(C), pages 114-121.
    9. Denise Doiron & Glenn Jones & Elizabeth Savage, 2008. "Healthy, wealthy and insured? The role of self‐assessed health in the demand for private health insurance," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 17(3), pages 317-334, March.
    10. Scott R. Baker & Nicholas Bloom & Steven J. Davis, 2016. "Measuring Economic Policy Uncertainty," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 131(4), pages 1593-1636.
    11. Kajal Lahiri & George Monokroussos & Yongchen Zhao, 2016. "Forecasting Consumption: the Role of Consumer Confidence in Real Time with many Predictors," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 31(7), pages 1254-1275, November.
    12. D'Mello, Ranjan & Toscano, Francesca, 2020. "Economic policy uncertainty and short-term financing: The case of trade credit," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 64(C).
    13. Gervais, Martin & Livshits, Igor & Meh, Césaire, 2008. "Uncertainty and the specificity of human capital," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 143(1), pages 469-498, November.
    14. Nilavongse, Rachatar & Rubaszek, Michał, & Uddin, Gazi Salah, 2020. "Economic policy uncertainty shocks, economic activity, and exchange rate adjustments," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 186(C).
    15. Catalina Amuedo-Dorantes & Kusum Mundra, 2007. "Social networks and their impact on the earnings of Mexican Migrants," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 44(4), pages 849-863, November.
    16. Aaberge, Rolf & Liu, Kai & Zhu, Yu, 2017. "Political uncertainty and household savings," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 45(1), pages 154-170.
    17. Al-Thaqeb, Saud Asaad & Algharabali, Barrak Ghanim, 2019. "Economic policy uncertainty: A literature review," The Journal of Economic Asymmetries, Elsevier, vol. 20(C).
    18. Erzo F. P. Luttmer & Andrew A. Samwick, 2018. "The Welfare Cost of Perceived Policy Uncertainty: Evidence from Social Security," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 108(2), pages 275-307, February.
    19. Frijns, Bart & Gilbert, Aaron & Lehnert, Thorsten & Tourani-Rad, Alireza, 2013. "Uncertainty avoidance, risk tolerance and corporate takeover decisions," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 37(7), pages 2457-2471.
    20. Altig, Dave & Baker, Scott & Barrero, Jose Maria & Bloom, Nicholas & Bunn, Philip & Chen, Scarlet & Davis, Steven J. & Leather, Julia & Meyer, Brent & Mihaylov, Emil & Mizen, Paul & Parker, Nicholas &, 2020. "Economic uncertainty before and during the COVID-19 pandemic," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 191(C).
    21. Itzhak Ben-David & Elyas Fermand & Camelia M. Kuhnen & Geng Li, 2018. "Expectations Uncertainty and Household Economic Behavior," NBER Working Papers 25336, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    22. Li, Zhenghui & Zhong, Junhao, 2020. "Impact of economic policy uncertainty shocks on China's financial conditions," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 35(C).
    23. Greg Kaplan & Giovanni L. Violante, 2014. "A Model of the Consumption Response to Fiscal Stimulus Payments," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 82(4), pages 1199-1239, July.
    24. Yin Zhang & Guang Hua Wan, 2004. "Liquidity constraint, uncertainty and household consumption in China," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 36(19), pages 2221-2229.
    25. Yeonggyu Yun & Hye-Young Jung, 2020. "Effects of Uncertainty Shocks on Household Consumption and Working Hours: A Fuzzy Cognitive Map-Based Approach," Mathematics, MDPI, vol. 8(6), pages 1-13, June.
    26. Phan, Hieu V. & Nguyen, Nam H. & Nguyen, Hien T. & Hegde, Shantaram, 2019. "Policy uncertainty and firm cash holdings," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 95(C), pages 71-82.
    27. Christian Bayer & Ralph Luetticke & Lien Pham‐Dao & Volker Tjaden, 2019. "Precautionary Savings, Illiquid Assets, and the Aggregate Consequences of Shocks to Household Income Risk," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 87(1), pages 255-290, January.
    28. Fabio Sabatini, 2008. "Does Social Capital Mitigate Precariousness?," Working Papers 2008.4, Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei.
    29. repec:bla:jfinan:v:59:y:2004:i:1:p:137-163 is not listed on IDEAS
    30. Bonaime, Alice & Gulen, Huseyin & Ion, Mihai, 2018. "Does policy uncertainty affect mergers and acquisitions?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 129(3), pages 531-558.
    31. Pietro Veronesi, 2019. "Heterogeneous Households under Uncertainty," NBER Working Papers 25448, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    32. Fumitaka Nakamura, 2019. "Household Income, Portfolio Choice and Heterogeneous Consumption Responses to Monetary Policy Shocks," IMES Discussion Paper Series 19-E-19, Institute for Monetary and Economic Studies, Bank of Japan.
    33. Feldstein, Martin S, 1974. "Social Security, Induced Retirement, and Aggregate Capital Accumulation," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 82(5), pages 905-926, Sept./Oct.
    34. Sophie Mitra & Michael Palmer & Shannon Pullaro & Daniel Mont & Nora Groce, 2017. "Health Insurance and Children in Low- and Middle-income Countries: A Review," The Economic Record, The Economic Society of Australia, vol. 93(302), pages 484-500, September.
    35. Marco Di Maggio & Amir Kermani & Rodney Ramcharan & Vincent Yao & Edison Yu, 2020. "The Pass-Through of Uncertainty Shocks to Households," NBER Working Papers 27646, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Chen, Zhenni & Zhang, Zengkai & Feng, Tong & Liu, Diyi, 2023. "What drives the temporal dynamics and spatial differences of urban and rural household emissions in China?," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 125(C).
    2. Xu, Can, 2023. "Do households react to policy uncertainty by increasing savings?," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 80(C), pages 770-785.
    3. Kai‐Hua Wang & Zu‐Shan Wang & Hong‐Wen Liu & Xin Li, 2023. "Economic policy uncertainty and geopolitical risk: evidence from China and Southeast Asia," Asian-Pacific Economic Literature, The Crawford School, The Australian National University, vol. 37(2), pages 96-118, November.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Shehub Bin Hasan & Md Samsul Alam & Sudharshan Reddy Paramati & Md Shahidul Islam, 2022. "Does firm-level political risk affect cash holdings?," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 59(1), pages 311-337, July.
    2. Deng, Wei & Gao, Lei & Xing, Fei & Yang, Ming, 2023. "Economic policy uncertainty, bank deposits, and liability structure," Emerging Markets Review, Elsevier, vol. 55(C).
    3. Sammy G. Muriithi & Bruce A. Walters & William R. McCumber & Luis R. Robles, 2022. "Managerial entrenchment and corporate social responsibility engagement: the role of economic policy uncertainty," Journal of Management & Governance, Springer;Accademia Italiana di Economia Aziendale (AIDEA), vol. 26(2), pages 621-640, June.
    4. Jeon, Chunmi & Mun, Seongjae & Han, Seung Hun, 2022. "Firm-level political risk, liquidity management, and managerial attributes," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 83(C).
    5. Badar Nadeem Ashraf, 2021. "Is Economic Uncertainty a Risk Factor in Bank Loan Pricing Decisions? International Evidence," Risks, MDPI, vol. 9(5), pages 1-17, April.
    6. D'Mello, Ranjan & Toscano, Francesca, 2020. "Economic policy uncertainty and short-term financing: The case of trade credit," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 64(C).
    7. Huang, Jin & Jin, Yong & Duan, Yang & She, Yanling, 2023. "Do Chinese firms speculate during high economic policy uncertainty? Evidence from wealth management products," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 87(C).
    8. Shen, Xieyang & Yang, Sijie & Chen, Yulin & Zeng, Jianyu, 2022. "How does economic policy uncertainty influence managers' learning from peers' stock prices? Evidence from China," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 74(C).
    9. repec:zbw:bofrdp:2022_005 is not listed on IDEAS
    10. Nguyen, Duc Nguyen & Nguyen, Canh Phuc & Dang, Le Phuong Xuan, 2022. "Uncertainty and corporate default risk: Novel evidence from emerging markets," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 78(C).
    11. Caixe, Daniel Ferreira, 2022. "Corporate governance and investment sensitivity to policy uncertainty in Brazil," Emerging Markets Review, Elsevier, vol. 51(PB).
    12. Ambrocio, Gene, 2020. "Inflationary household uncertainty shocks," Bank of Finland Research Discussion Papers 5/2020, Bank of Finland.
    13. Nam, Eun-Young & Lee, Kiryoung & Jeon, Yoontae, 2021. "Macroeconomic uncertainty shocks and households’ consumption choice," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 68(C).
    14. Carmen Cotei & Joseph Farhat & Indu Khurana, 2022. "The impact of policy uncertainty on the M&A exit of startup firms," Journal of Economics and Finance, Springer;Academy of Economics and Finance, vol. 46(1), pages 99-120, January.
    15. French, Joseph J. & Li, Wei-Xuan, 2022. "Economic policy uncertainty and fund flows to the United States," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 45(C).
    16. Hoang, Khanh & Nguyen, Cuong & Zhang, Hailiang, 2021. "How does economic policy uncertainty affect corporate diversification?," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 72(C), pages 254-269.
    17. Li, Xiang, 2022. "How does economic policy uncertainty affect corporate debt maturity?," IWH Discussion Papers 5/2022, Halle Institute for Economic Research (IWH).
    18. Ines Kahloul & Jocelyn Grira & Khawla Hlel, 2023. "The trilogy of economic policy uncertainty, earnings management and firm performance: empirical evidence from France," Journal of Economics and Finance, Springer;Academy of Economics and Finance, vol. 47(1), pages 184-206, March.
    19. Bahram Adrangi & Arjun Chatrath & Kambiz Raffiee, 2023. "S&P 500 volatility, volatility regimes, and economic uncertainty," Bulletin of Economic Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 75(4), pages 1362-1387, October.
    20. Ambrocio, Gene, 2020. "Inflationary household uncertainty shocks," Research Discussion Papers 5/2020, Bank of Finland.
    21. Shabir, Mohsin & Jiang, Ping & Bakhsh, Satar & Zhao, Zhongxiu, 2021. "Economic policy uncertainty and bank stability: Threshold effect of institutional quality and competition," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 68(C).

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:asieco:v:79:y:2022:i:c:s1049007821001640. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    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 CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc 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 RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/asieco .

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

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.