IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/ecmode/v28y2011i1-2p501-514.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Productivity growth and the U.S. saving rate

Author

Listed:
  • Iscan, Talan B.

Abstract

Over the last half century, the saving rate in the United States exhibited significant variations. In this paper, I examine whether a general equilibrium model that allows for shifts in the growth rate of total factor productivity can account for these variations. The model generates significant medium-run variations in the U.S. saving rate, and establishes a link between episodes of productivity growth slowdowns or accelerations and the saving rate--two concepts that have often been treated in isolation. While a productivity-growth based explanation is able to account for broader trends in the rising consumption-income ratio from about 1980 to 2000, there are other episodes during which the model is less successful.

Suggested Citation

  • Iscan, Talan B., 2011. "Productivity growth and the U.S. saving rate," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 28(1-2), pages 501-514, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:ecmode:v:28:y:2011:i:1-2:p:501-514
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0264-9993(10)00118-5
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    ---><---

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

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. anonymous, 1995. "Does the bouncing ball lead to economic growth?," Regional Update, Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta, issue Jul, pages 1-2,4-6.
    2. Dale W. Jorgenson & Mun S. Ho & Kevin J. Stiroh, 2008. "A Retrospective Look at the U.S. Productivity Growth Resurgence," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 22(1), pages 3-24, Winter.
    3. R. Anton Braun & Daisuke Ikeda & Douglas H. Joines, 2006. "Saving and interest rates in Japan: Why they have fallen and why they will remain low," Proceedings, Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, issue Jun.
    4. Robert J. Barro, 2013. "Inflation and Economic Growth," Annals of Economics and Finance, Society for AEF, vol. 14(1), pages 121-144, May.
    5. Barry Bosworth & Gary Burtless & John Sabelhaus, 1991. "The Decline in Saving: Evidence from Household Surveys," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 22(1), pages 183-256.
    6. Cooley, Thomas F & Ohanian, Lee E, 1997. "Postwar British Economic Growth and the Legacy of Keynes," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 105(3), pages 439-472, June.
    7. Selahattin Imrohoroglu & Ayse Imrohoroglu & Kaiji Chen, 2006. "The Japanese Saving Rate," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 96(5), pages 1850-1858, December.
    8. Gary Koop & Simon M. Potter & Rodney W. Strachan, 2008. "Re-Examining the Consumption-Wealth Relationship: The Role of Model Uncertainty," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 40(2-3), pages 341-367, March.
    9. Gordon,Robert J., 2004. "Productivity Growth, Inflation, and Unemployment," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521531429.
    10. Jonathan A. Parker, 2000. "Spendthrift in America? On Two Decades of Decline in the US Saving Rate," NBER Chapters, in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 1999, Volume 14, pages 317-387, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    11. Martin Lettau & Sydney C. Ludvigson, 2004. "Understanding Trend and Cycle in Asset Values: Reevaluating the Wealth Effect on Consumption," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 94(1), pages 276-299, March.
    12. Mendoza, Enrique G. & Razin, Assaf & Tesar, Linda L., 1994. "Effective tax rates in macroeconomics: Cross-country estimates of tax rates on factor incomes and consumption," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 34(3), pages 297-323, December.
    13. Jagadeesh Gokhale & Laurence J. Kotlikoff & John Sabelhaus, 1996. "Understanding the Postwar Decline in U.S. Saving: A Cohort Analysis," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 27(1), pages 315-407.
    14. Donihue Michael & Avramenko Andriy, 2007. "Decomposing Consumer Wealth Effects: Evidence on the Role of Real Estate Assets Following the Wealth Cycle of 1990-2002," The B.E. Journal of Macroeconomics, De Gruyter, vol. 7(1), pages 1-33, August.
    15. Ghironi, Fabio & Iscan, Talan B. & Rebucci, Alessandro, 2008. "Net foreign asset positions and consumption dynamics in the international economy," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 27(8), pages 1337-1359, December.
    16. Stephanie E. Curcuru & Tomas Dvorak & Francis E. Warnock, 2008. "Cross-Border Returns Differentials," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 123(4), pages 1495-1530.
    17. Cynamon Barry Z. & Fazzari Steven M., 2008. "Household Debt in the Consumer Age: Source of Growth--Risk of Collapse," Capitalism and Society, De Gruyter, vol. 3(2), pages 1-32, October.
    18. Matthias Doepke & Martin Schneider, 2006. "Inflation and the Redistribution of Nominal Wealth," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 114(6), pages 1069-1097, December.
    19. Chen, Kaiji & Imrohoroglu, Ayse & Imrohoroglu, Selahattin, 2009. "A quantitative assessment of the decline in the U.S. current account," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 56(8), pages 1135-1147, November.
    20. John Y. Campbell & N. Gregory Mankiw, 1989. "Consumption, Income, and Interest Rates: Reinterpreting the Time Series Evidence," NBER Chapters, in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 1989, Volume 4, pages 185-246, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    21. repec:fth:harver:1435 is not listed on IDEAS
    22. Edge, Rochelle M. & Laubach, Thomas & Williams, John C., 2007. "Learning and shifts in long-run productivity growth," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 54(8), pages 2421-2438, November.
    23. Karl Whelan & Filippo Altissimo & Evaggelia Georgiou & Teresa Sastre & Maria Teresa Valderrama & Gabriel Sterne & Marc Stocker & Mark Weth & Alpo Willman, 2005. "Wealth and asset price effects on economic activity," Open Access publications 10197/210, School of Economics, University College Dublin.
    24. Jeremy Rudd & Karl Whelan, 2006. "Empirical Proxies for the Consumption-Wealth Ratio," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 9(1), pages 34-51, January.
    25. Alexandre, Fernando & Bacao, Pedro & Gabriel, Vasco J., 2007. "Volatility in asset prices and long-run wealth effect estimates," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 24(6), pages 1048-1064, November.
    26. 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.
    27. Mark Aguiar & Erik Hurst, 2007. "Measuring Trends in Leisure: The Allocation of Time Over Five Decades," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 122(3), pages 969-1006.
    28. Merton, Robert C, 1969. "Lifetime Portfolio Selection under Uncertainty: The Continuous-Time Case," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 51(3), pages 247-257, August.
    29. Deaton, Angus, 1992. "Understanding Consumption," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780198288244, Decembrie.
    30. Evans, Owen J, 1984. "Empirical Tests of the Life Cycle Hypothesis: Comment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 74(1), pages 254-257, March.
    31. Charles Steindel, 2007. "How worrisome is a negative saving rate?," Current Issues in Economics and Finance, Federal Reserve Bank of New York, vol. 13(May).
    32. Karl Whelan & Filippo Altissimo & Evaggelia Georgiou & Teresa Sastre & Maria Teresa Valderrama & Gabriel Sterne & Marc Stocker & Mark Weth & Alpo Willman, 2005. "Wealth and asset price effects on economic activity," Open Access publications 10197/210, School of Economics, University College Dublin.
    33. White, Betsy Buttrill, 1978. "Empirical Tests of the Life Cycle Hypothesis," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 68(4), pages 547-560, September.
    34. Gomme, Paul & Rupert, Peter, 2007. "Theory, measurement and calibration of macroeconomic models," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 54(2), pages 460-497, March.
    35. Poterba, James M., 1998. "The rate of return to corporate capital and factor shares: new estimates using revised national income accounts and capital stock data," Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 48(1), pages 211-246, June.
    36. Gordon,Robert J., 2004. "Productivity Growth, Inflation, and Unemployment," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521800082.
    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. Giusto, Andrea & İşcan, Talan B., 2019. "Market Power And The Aggregate Saving Rate," Macroeconomic Dynamics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 23(6), pages 2269-2297, September.
    2. Steven D. Silver, 2015. "Human capital in personal consumption and labour force productivity: evidence from an OECD panel," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 22(7), pages 529-538, May.

    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. Talan B. Işcan, 2008. "Productivity Growth and the Future of the U.S. Saving Rate," Working Papers daleconwp2009-02, Dalhousie University, Department of Economics.
    2. Muellbauer, John & Aron, Janine & Duca, John V & Murata, Keiko & Murphy, Anthony, 2010. "Credit, Housing Collateral and Consumption: Evidence from the UK, Japan and the US," CEPR Discussion Papers 7876, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    3. Stijn Claessens & M Ayhan Kose, 2017. "Asset prices and macroeconomic outcomes: a survey," BIS Working Papers 676, Bank for International Settlements.
    4. Kaiji Chen & Ayşe İmrohoroğlu & Selahattin İmrohoroğlu, 2007. "The Japanese saving rate between 1960 and 2000: productivity, policy changes, and demographics," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 32(1), pages 87-104, July.
    5. Chauvin, V. & Damette, O., 2010. "Wealth effects: the French case," Working papers 276, Banque de France.
    6. Stijn Claessens & M Ayhan Kose, 2018. "Frontiers of macrofinancial linkages," BIS Papers, Bank for International Settlements, number 95.
    7. Mr. Christopher Carroll & Mr. Martin Sommer & Mr. Jiri Slacalek, 2012. "Dissecting Saving Dynamics: Measuring Wealth, Precautionary, and Credit Effects," IMF Working Papers 2012/219, International Monetary Fund.
    8. Christopher D. Carroll & Edmund Crawley & Jiri Slacalek & Kiichi Tokuoka & Matthew N. White, 2020. "Sticky Expectations and Consumption Dynamics," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 12(3), pages 40-76, July.
    9. De Veirman Emmanuel & Dunstan Ashley, 2011. "Time-Varying Returns, Intertemporal Substitution and Cyclical Variation in Consumption," The B.E. Journal of Macroeconomics, De Gruyter, vol. 11(1), pages 1-41, July.
    10. Malin Gardberg & Lorenzo Pozzi, 2022. "Aggregate consumption and wealth in the long run: The impact of financial liberalization," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 37(1), pages 161-186, January.
    11. Alain Galli, 2017. "How Reliable are Cointegration-Based Estimates for Wealth Effects on Consumption? Evidence from Switzerland," Swiss Journal of Economics and Statistics, Springer;Swiss Society of Economics and Statistics, vol. 153(4), pages 437-479, October.
    12. Ton Van Schaik & Theo van De Klundert, 2011. "Employment Protection Legislation and Catching up," Post-Print hal-00747937, HAL.
    13. Slacalek Jiri, 2009. "What Drives Personal Consumption? The Role of Housing and Financial Wealth," The B.E. Journal of Macroeconomics, De Gruyter, vol. 9(1), pages 1-37, October.
    14. Ersi Athanassiou & Ekaterini Tsouma, 2017. "Financial and Housing Wealth Effects on Private Consumption: The Case of Greece," South-Eastern Europe Journal of Economics, Association of Economic Universities of South and Eastern Europe and the Black Sea Region, vol. 15(1), pages 63-86.
    15. Muellbauer, John, 2016. "Macroeconomics and Consumption," CEPR Discussion Papers 11588, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    16. Christopher D. Carroll & Misuzu Otsuka & Jiri Slacalek, 2011. "How Large Are Housing and Financial Wealth Effects? A New Approach," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 43(1), pages 55-79, February.
    17. Peltonen, Tuomas A. & Sousa, Ricardo M. & Vansteenkiste, Isabel S., 2012. "Wealth effects in emerging market economies," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 24(C), pages 155-166.
    18. Chen, Kaiji & Imrohoroglu, Ayse & Imrohoroglu, Selahattin, 2009. "A quantitative assessment of the decline in the U.S. current account," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 56(8), pages 1135-1147, November.
    19. Frank Schmid, 2013. "Wealth Effects on Consumption in Switzerland," Swiss Journal of Economics and Statistics (SJES), Swiss Society of Economics and Statistics (SSES), vol. 149(I), pages 87-110, March.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Consumption-income ratio Saving rate Productivity growth United States;

    JEL classification:

    • E2 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:ecmode:v:28:y:2011:i:1-2:p:501-514. 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/inca/30411 .

    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.