IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/proeco/v93-94y2005i1p75-86.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Inventory investment and output volatility

Author

Listed:
  • Irvine, F. Owen
  • Schuh, Scott

Abstract

This paper reports the results of a detailed examination of the hypothesis that improved inventory management and production techniques are responsible for the decline in the volatility of U.S. GDP growth. Our innovations are to look at the data at a finer level of disaggregation than previous studies, to exploit cross-sectional heterogeneity to obtain clearer identification of this hypothesis, and to provide a complete accounting of the change in GDP volatility. Changes in inventory behavior can account directly for only up to half of the total reduction in GDP volatility. Cross-section evidence from the manufacturing and trade sector indicates that change in the covariance structure among industries accounts for most of the remaining portion of the reduction in GDP volatility. Sales have become less correlated among industries and inventory investment has become more correlated. These distinctive changes in co-movement of industries suggest that development and management of supply chains may be an indirect channel through which changes in inventory management and production techniques have influenced GDP volatility.
(This abstract was borrowed from another version of this item.)

Suggested Citation

  • Irvine, F. Owen & Schuh, Scott, 2005. "Inventory investment and output volatility," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 93(1), pages 75-86, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:proeco:v:93-94:y:2005:i:1:p:75-86
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0925-5273(04)00228-2
    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. JONATHAN McCARTHY & EGON ZAKRAJSEK, 2007. "Inventory Dynamics and Business Cycles: What Has Changed?," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 39(2-3), pages 591-613, March.
    2. Olivier Blanchard & John Simon, 2001. "The Long and Large Decline in U.S. Output Volatility," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 32(1), pages 135-174.
    3. Humphreys, Brad R. & Maccini, Louis J. & Schuh, Scott, 2001. "Input and output inventories," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 47(2), pages 347-375, April.
    4. Margaret M. McConnell & Patricia C. Mosser & Gabriel Perez-Quiros, 1999. "A decomposition of the increased stability of GDP growth," Current Issues in Economics and Finance, Federal Reserve Bank of New York, vol. 5(Aug).
    5. James H. Stock & Mark W. Watson, 2003. "Has the Business Cycle Changed and Why?," NBER Chapters, in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 2002, Volume 17, pages 159-230, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    6. Kim, Chang-Jin & Nelson, Charles R & Piger, Jeremy, 2004. "The Less-Volatile U.S. Economy: A Bayesian Investigation of Timing, Breadth, and Potential Explanations," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 22(1), pages 80-93, January.
    7. Francis E. Warnock & Veronica C. Warnock, 2000. "The declining volatility of U.S. employment: was Arthur Burns right?," International Finance Discussion Papers 677, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    8. Karl Whelan, 2000. "A guide to the use of chain aggregated NIPA data," Open Access publications 10197/253, School of Economics, University College Dublin.
    9. Valerie A. Ramey & Daniel J. Vine, 2004. "Tracking the Source of the Decline in GDP Volatility: An Analysis of the Automobile Industry," NBER Working Papers 10384, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    10. Margaret M. McConnell & Gabriel Perez-Quiros, 2000. "Output fluctuations in the United States: what has changed since the early 1980s?," Proceedings, Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, issue Mar.
    11. James A. Kahn & Margaret M. McConnell & Gabriel Perez-Quiros, 2002. "On the causes of the increased stability of the U.S. economy," Economic Policy Review, Federal Reserve Bank of New York, vol. 8(May), pages 183-202.
    12. James A. Kahn & Margaret M. McConnell, 2002. "Has inventory volatility returned? A look at the current cycle," Current Issues in Economics and Finance, Federal Reserve Bank of New York, vol. 8(May).
    13. Chang-Jin Kim & Charles R. Nelson, 1999. "Has The U.S. Economy Become More Stable? A Bayesian Approach Based On A Markov-Switching Model Of The Business Cycle," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 81(4), pages 608-616, November.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Steven J. Davis & James A. Kahn, 2008. "Interpreting the Great Moderation: Changes in the Volatility of Economic Activity at the Macro and Micro Levels," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 22(4), pages 155-180, Fall.
    2. JONATHAN McCARTHY & EGON ZAKRAJSEK, 2007. "Inventory Dynamics and Business Cycles: What Has Changed?," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 39(2-3), pages 591-613, March.
    3. Irvine, F. Owen & Schuh, Scott, 2007. "Interest sensitivity and volatility reductions: Cross-section evidence," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 108(1-2), pages 31-42, July.
    4. F. Owen Irvine & Scott Schuh, 2007. "The roles of comovement and inventory investment in the reduction of output volatility," Proceedings, Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, issue Nov.
    5. Dynan, Karen E. & Elmendorf, Douglas W. & Sichel, Daniel E., 2006. "Can financial innovation help to explain the reduced volatility of economic activity?," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 53(1), pages 123-150, January.
    6. Enders, Walter & Ma, Jun, 2011. "Sources of the great moderation: A time-series analysis of GDP subsectors," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 35(1), pages 67-79, January.
    7. Owyang, Michael T. & Piger, Jeremy & Wall, Howard J., 2008. "A state-level analysis of the Great Moderation," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 38(6), pages 578-589, November.
    8. Marianne Sensier & Dick van Dijk, 2004. "Testing for Volatility Changes in U.S. Macroeconomic Time Series," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 86(3), pages 833-839, August.
    9. Grydaki, Maria & Bezemer, Dirk, 2013. "The role of credit in the Great Moderation: A multivariate GARCH approach," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 37(11), pages 4615-4626.
    10. Kevin J. Stiroh, 2009. "Volatility Accounting: A Production Perspective on Increased Economic Stability," Journal of the European Economic Association, MIT Press, vol. 7(4), pages 671-696, June.
    11. William Martin & Robert Rowthorn, 2004. "Will Stability Last?," CESifo Working Paper Series 1324, CESifo.
    12. Matteo Iacoviello & Fabio Schiantarelli & Scott Schuh, 2011. "Input And Output Inventories In General Equilibrium," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 52(4), pages 1179-1213, November.
    13. van Dijk, D.J.C. & Osborn, D.R. & Sensier, M., 2002. "Changes in variability of the business cycle in the G7 countries," Econometric Institute Research Papers EI 2002-28, Erasmus University Rotterdam, Erasmus School of Economics (ESE), Econometric Institute.
    14. Louis J. Maccini & Adrian Pagan, 2006. "Inventories, Fluctuations and Business Cycles. Working paper #4," NCER Working Paper Series 4, National Centre for Econometric Research.
    15. Wen, Yi, 2004. "Durable Goods Inventories and the Volatility of Production: Explaining the Less Volatile U.S. Economy," Working Papers 04-01, Cornell University, Center for Analytic Economics.
    16. Alejandro Justiniano & Giorgio E. Primiceri, 2008. "The Time-Varying Volatility of Macroeconomic Fluctuations," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 98(3), pages 604-641, June.
    17. Irvine, F. Owen, 2007. "Sales persistence and the reduction in GDP volatility," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 108(1-2), pages 22-30, July.
    18. Benhmad, François, 2013. "Dynamic cyclical comovements between oil prices and US GDP: A wavelet perspective," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 57(C), pages 141-151.
    19. Steven J. Davis & James A. Kahn, 2007. "Macroeconomic implications of changes in micro volatility," Proceedings, Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, issue Nov.
    20. James A. Kahn, 2008. "Durable goods inventories and the Great Moderation," Staff Reports 325, Federal Reserve Bank of New York.

    More about this item

    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:proeco:v:93-94:y:2005:i:1:p:75-86. 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/ijpe .

    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.