IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ces/ceswps/_7105.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Economic Policy Uncertainty and Unemployment in the United States: A Nonlinear Approach

Author

Listed:
  • Giovanni Caggiano
  • Efrem Castelnuovo
  • Juan Manuel Figueres

Abstract

We model U.S. post-WWII monthly data with a Smooth Transition VAR model and study the effects of an unanticipated increase in economic policy uncertainty on unemployment in recessions and expansions. We find the response of unemployment to be statistically and economically larger in recessions. A state-contingent forecast error variance decomposition analysis confirms that the contribution of EPU shocks to the volatility of unemployment at business cycle frequencies is markedly larger in recessions.

Suggested Citation

  • Giovanni Caggiano & Efrem Castelnuovo & Juan Manuel Figueres, 2018. "Economic Policy Uncertainty and Unemployment in the United States: A Nonlinear Approach," CESifo Working Paper Series 7105, CESifo.
    • Handle: RePEc:ces:ceswps:_7105
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.cesifo.org/DocDL/cesifo1_wp7105.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Nodari, Gabriela, 2014. "Financial regulation policy uncertainty and credit spreads in the US," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 122-132.
    2. Caggiano, Giovanni & Castelnuovo, Efrem & Groshenny, Nicolas, 2014. "Uncertainty shocks and unemployment dynamics in U.S. recessions," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 67(C), pages 78-92.
    3. Michael W. McCracken & Serena Ng, 2016. "FRED-MD: A Monthly Database for Macroeconomic Research," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 34(4), pages 574-589, October.
    4. 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.
    5. Nicholas Bloom, 2009. "The Impact of Uncertainty Shocks," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 77(3), pages 623-685, May.
    6. Fleissig, 2015. "Changes in aggregate food demand over the business cycle," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 22(17), pages 1366-1371, November.
    7. Timo Teräsvirta & Yukai Yang, 2014. "Linearity and Misspecification Tests for Vector Smooth Transition Regression Models," CREATES Research Papers 2014-04, Department of Economics and Business Economics, Aarhus University.
    8. ., 2015. "Income distribution and the business cycle," Chapters, in: The New Economics of Income Distribution, chapter 5, pages 96-122, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    9. Markku Lanne & Henri Nyberg, 2016. "Generalized Forecast Error Variance Decomposition for Linear and Nonlinear Multivariate Models," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 78(4), pages 595-603, August.
    10. Matteo Cacciatore, 2015. "Uncertainty and the Business Cycle," 2015 Meeting Papers 1440, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    11. James Morley & Jeremy Piger, 2012. "The Asymmetric Business Cycle," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 94(1), pages 208-221, February.
    12. Scott R. Baker & Nicholas Bloom & Brandice Canes-Wrone & Steven J. Davis & Jonathan Rodden, 2014. "Why Has US Policy Uncertainty Risen since 1960?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 104(5), pages 56-60, May.
    13. Koop, Gary & Pesaran, M. Hashem & Potter, Simon M., 1996. "Impulse response analysis in nonlinear multivariate models," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 74(1), pages 119-147, September.
    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. Caggiano, Giovanni & Castelnuovo, Efrem & Pellegrino, Giovanni, 2017. "Estimating the real effects of uncertainty shocks at the Zero Lower Bound," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 100(C), pages 257-272.
    2. Giovanni Caggiano & Efrem Castelnuovo & Gabriela Nodari, 2014. "Uncertainty and Monetary Policy in Good and Bad Times," "Marco Fanno" Working Papers 0188, Dipartimento di Scienze Economiche "Marco Fanno".
    3. Magnus Reif, 2020. "Macroeconomics, Nonlinearities, and the Business Cycle," ifo Beiträge zur Wirtschaftsforschung, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, number 87.
    4. Christopher Thiem, 2020. "Cross-Category, Trans-Pacific Spillovers of Policy Uncertainty and Financial Market Volatility," Open Economies Review, Springer, vol. 31(2), pages 317-342, April.
    5. Giovanni Caggiano & Efrem Castelnuovo & Juan Manuel Figueres, 2020. "Economic Policy Uncertainty Spillovers in Booms and Busts," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 82(1), pages 125-155, February.
    6. Hwang, Inwook & Kim, Jaebeom, 2021. "Oil price shocks and the US stock market: A nonlinear approach," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 64(C), pages 23-36.
    7. Herwartz, Helmut & Rohloff, Hannes, 2018. "Less bang for the buck? Assessing the role of inflation uncertainty for U.S. monetary policy transmission in a data rich environment," University of Göttingen Working Papers in Economics 358, University of Goettingen, Department of Economics.
    8. Idriss Fontaine, 2021. "Uncertainty and Labour Force Participation," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 83(2), pages 437-471, April.
    9. Ahmed Ali & Granberg Mark & Uddin Gazi Salah & Troster Victor, 2022. "Asymmetric dynamics between uncertainty and unemployment flows in the United States," Studies in Nonlinear Dynamics & Econometrics, De Gruyter, vol. 26(1), pages 155-172, February.
    10. Gabriel Caldas Montes & Pedro Salgado, 2024. "Economic policy uncertainties and business confidence in Japan," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 44(1), pages 38-56.
    11. Kevin Larcher & Jaebeom Kim & Youngju Kim, 2019. "Uncertainty shocks and asymmetric dynamics in Korea: a non-linear approach," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 51(6), pages 594-610, February.
    12. Reif Magnus, 2021. "Macroeconomic uncertainty and forecasting macroeconomic aggregates," Studies in Nonlinear Dynamics & Econometrics, De Gruyter, vol. 25(2), pages 1-20, April.
    13. Giovanni Pellegrino & Federico Ravenna & Gabriel Züllig, 2021. "The Impact of Pessimistic Expectations on the Effects of COVID‐19‐Induced Uncertainty in the Euro Area," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 83(4), pages 841-869, August.
    14. Jiang, Yonghong & He, Luli & Meng, Juan & Nie, He, 2019. "Nonlinear impact of economic policy uncertainty shocks on credit scale: Evidence from China," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 521(C), pages 626-634.
    15. Balcilar, Mehmet & Ozdemir, Zeynel Abidin & Ozdemir, Huseyin & Wohar, Mark E., 2020. "Transmission of US and EU Economic Policy Uncertainty Shock to Asian Economies in Bad and Good Times," IZA Discussion Papers 13274, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    16. Josué Diwambuena & Jean-Paul K. Tsasa, 2021. "The Real Effects of Uncertainty Shocks: New Evidence from Linear and Nonlinear SVAR Models," BEMPS - Bozen Economics & Management Paper Series BEMPS87, Faculty of Economics and Management at the Free University of Bozen.
    17. Nalban, Valeriu & Smădu, Andra, 2021. "Asymmetric effects of uncertainty shocks: Normal times and financial disruptions are different," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 69(C).
    18. Rangan Gupta & Chi Keung Marco Lau & Mark E. Wohar, 2019. "The impact of US uncertainty on the Euro area in good and bad times: evidence from a quantile structural vector autoregressive model," Empirica, Springer;Austrian Institute for Economic Research;Austrian Economic Association, vol. 46(2), pages 353-368, May.
    19. Quelhas, João, 2022. "Monetary Policy Uncertainty and its impact on the real economy: Empirical Evidence from the Euro area," MPRA Paper 113621, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised May 2022.
    20. Arigoni, Filippo & Lenarčič, Črt, 2020. "The impact of trade policy uncertainty shocks on the Euro Area," MPRA Paper 100832, University Library of Munich, Germany.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    economic policy uncertainty shocks; unemployment dynamics; Smooth Transition Vector AutoRegressions; recessions; expansions;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C32 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Multiple or Simultaneous Equation Models; Multiple Variables - - - Time-Series Models; Dynamic Quantile Regressions; Dynamic Treatment Effect Models; Diffusion Processes; State Space Models
    • E32 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Business Fluctuations; Cycles
    • E52 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit - - - Monetary Policy

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:ces:ceswps:_7105. 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: Klaus Wohlrabe (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/cesifde.html .

    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.