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The Right Fit for the Wrong Reasons: Real Business Cycle in an Oil-dependent Economy

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  • Miguel Santos

Abstract

Venezuela has an oil-dependent economy subject to large exogenous shocks and a rigid labor market. These features go straight to the heart of two weaknesses of real business cycle (RBC) theory widely reported in the literature: neither shocks are volatile enough nor real salaries sufficiently flexible as required by the RBC framework to replicate the behavior of the economy. We calibrate a basic RBC model and compare a set of relevant statistics from RBC-simulated time series with actual data for Venezuela and the benchmark case of the United States (1950-2008). Despite Venezuela being a heavily regulated economy, RBC-simulated series provide a good t, in particular with regard to labor markets.

Suggested Citation

  • Miguel Santos, 2016. "The Right Fit for the Wrong Reasons: Real Business Cycle in an Oil-dependent Economy," Latin American Journal of Economics-formerly Cuadernos de Economía, Instituto de Economía. Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile., vol. 53(1), pages 61-94, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:ioe:cuadec:v:53:y:2016:i:1:p:61-94
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    macroeconomics; RBC; oil shocks; labor markets; Venezuela;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • E10 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - General Aggregative Models - - - General
    • E32 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Business Fluctuations; Cycles
    • O47 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Growth and Aggregate Productivity - - - Empirical Studies of Economic Growth; Aggregate Productivity; Cross-Country Output Convergence
    • O54 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economywide Country Studies - - - Latin America; Caribbean
    • Q32 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Nonrenewable Resources and Conservation - - - Exhaustible Resources and Economic Development

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