IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/fip/feddwp/92899.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Countercyclical Fluctuations in Uncertainty are Endogenous

Author

Abstract

This paper uses a battery of calibrated and estimated structural models to determine the causal drivers of the negative correlation between output and aggregate uncertainty. We find the transmission of uncertainty shocks to output is weak, while aggregate uncertainty endogenously responds to first moment shocks in the presence of labor market search frictions. This indicates that countercyclical movements in aggregate uncertainty are endogenous responses to changes in output, rather than exogenous impulses. A vector autoregression on simulated data shows recursive identification techniques do not robustly identify structural uncertainty shocks.

Suggested Citation

  • Joshua Bernstein & Michael D. Plante & Alexander W. Richter & Nathaniel A. Throckmorton, 2021. "Countercyclical Fluctuations in Uncertainty are Endogenous," Working Papers 2109, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.
    • Handle: RePEc:fip:feddwp:92899
    DOI: 10.24149/wp2109
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.dallasfed.org/-/media/documents/research/papers/2021/wp2109.pdf
    File Function: Full text
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.24149/wp2109?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
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Maksim Isakin & Phuong V. Ngo, 2020. "Variance Decomposition Analysis for Nonlinear Economic Models," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 82(6), pages 1362-1374, December.
    2. Olivier Blanchard & Jordi Galí, 2010. "Labor Markets and Monetary Policy: A New Keynesian Model with Unemployment," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 2(2), pages 1-30, April.
    3. repec:wop:calsdi:97-23 is not listed on IDEAS
    4. Christopher A. Pissarides & Barbara Petrongolo, 2001. "Looking into the Black Box: A Survey of the Matching Function," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 39(2), pages 390-431, June.
    5. Susanto Basu & Brent Bundick, 2017. "Uncertainty Shocks in a Model of Effective Demand," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 85, pages 937-958, May.
    6. Haroon Mumtaz & Francesco Zanetti, 2013. "The Impact of the Volatility of Monetary Policy Shocks," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 45(4), pages 535-558, June.
    7. Cosmin Ilut & Matthias Kehrig & Martin Schneider, 2018. "Slow to Hire, Quick to Fire: Employment Dynamics with Asymmetric Responses to News," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 126(5), pages 2011-2071.
    8. Jesus Fernandez-Villaverde & Pablo Guerron-Quintana & Juan F. Rubio-Ramirez & Martin Uribe, 2011. "Risk Matters: The Real Effects of Volatility Shocks," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(6), pages 2530-2561, October.
    9. Saijo, Hikaru, 2017. "The uncertainty multiplier and business cycles," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 78(C), pages 1-25.
    10. 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.
    11. 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.
    12. Garey Ramey & Wouter J. den Haan & Joel Watson, 2000. "Job Destruction and Propagation of Shocks," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 90(3), pages 482-498, June.
    13. Karen Kopecky & Richard Suen, 2010. "Finite State Markov-chain Approximations to Highly Persistent Processes," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 13(3), pages 701-714, July.
    14. 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.
    15. Sanjay Chugh, 2016. "Firm Risk and Leverage-Based Business Cycles," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 20, pages 111-131, April.
    16. Raj Chetty & Adam Guren & Day Manoli & Andrea Weber, 2013. "Does Indivisible Labor Explain the Difference between Micro and Macro Elasticities? A Meta-Analysis of Extensive Margin Elasticities," NBER Macroeconomics Annual, University of Chicago Press, vol. 27(1), pages 1-56.
    17. Jermann, Urban J., 1998. "Asset pricing in production economies," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 41(2), pages 257-275, April.
    18. Dale Mortensen & Eva Nagypal, 2007. "More on Unemployment and Vacancy Fluctuations," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 10(3), pages 327-347, July.
    19. Den Haan, Wouter J. & Freund, Lukas B. & Rendahl, Pontus, 2021. "Volatile hiring: uncertainty in search and matching models," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 123(C), pages 1-18.
    20. Jesús Fernández-Villaverde & Pablo Guerrón-Quintana & Keith Kuester & Juan Rubio-Ramírez, 2015. "Fiscal Volatility Shocks and Economic Activity," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 105(11), pages 3352-3384, November.
    21. 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.
    22. Gary Solon & Ryan Michaels & Michael W. L. Elsby, 2009. "The Ins and Outs of Cyclical Unemployment," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 1(1), pages 84-110, January.
    23. Merz, Monika, 1995. "Search in the labor market and the real business cycle," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 36(2), pages 269-300, November.
    24. Alexander Richter & Nathaniel Throckmorton & Todd Walker, 2014. "Accuracy, Speed and Robustness of Policy Function Iteration," Computational Economics, Springer;Society for Computational Economics, vol. 44(4), pages 445-476, December.
    25. James D. Hamilton, 2018. "Why You Should Never Use the Hodrick-Prescott Filter," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 100(5), pages 831-843, December.
    26. Kyle Jurado & Sydney C. Ludvigson & Serena Ng, 2015. "Measuring Uncertainty," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 105(3), pages 1177-1216, March.
    27. Straub, Ludwig & Ulbricht, Robert, 2015. "Endogenous Uncertainty and Credit Crunches," TSE Working Papers 15-604, Toulouse School of Economics (TSE), revised Dec 2017.
    28. Tyler Atkinson & Michael Plante & Alexander Richter & Nathaniel Throckmorton, 2022. "Complementarity and Macroeconomic Uncertainty," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 44, pages 225-243, April.
    29. Coleman, Wilbur John, II, 1991. "Equilibrium in a Production Economy with an Income Tax," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 59(4), pages 1091-1104, July.
    30. Newey, Whitney & West, Kenneth, 2014. "A simple, positive semi-definite, heteroscedasticity and autocorrelation consistent covariance matrix," Applied Econometrics, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration (RANEPA), vol. 33(1), pages 125-132.
    31. Matteo Cacciatore & Federico Ravenna, 2021. "Uncertainty, Wages and the Business Cycle," The Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 131(639), pages 2797-2823.
    32. Cristina Arellano & Yan Bai & Patrick J. Kehoe, 2019. "Financial Frictions and Fluctuations in Volatility," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 127(5), pages 2049-2103.
    33. Born, Benjamin & Pfeifer, Johannes, 2014. "Policy risk and the business cycle," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 68(C), pages 68-85.
    34. Sims, Christopher A, 2002. "Solving Linear Rational Expectations Models," Computational Economics, Springer;Society for Computational Economics, vol. 20(1-2), pages 1-20, October.
    35. Jae Sim & Egon Zakrajsek & Simon Gilchrist, 2010. "Uncertainty, Financial Frictions, and Investment Dynamics," 2010 Meeting Papers 1285, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    36. Markus K. Brunnermeier & Yuliy Sannikov, 2014. "A Macroeconomic Model with a Financial Sector," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 104(2), pages 379-421, February.
    37. Benhabib, Jess & Liu, Xuewen & Wang, Pengfei, 2016. "Endogenous information acquisition and countercyclical uncertainty," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 165(C), pages 601-642.
    38. Robert Shimer, 2005. "The Cyclical Behavior of Equilibrium Unemployment and Vacancies," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(1), pages 25-49, March.
    39. Ruge-Murcia, Francisco, 2012. "Estimating nonlinear DSGE models by the simulated method of moments: With an application to business cycles," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 36(6), pages 914-938.
    40. Rotemberg, Julio J, 1982. "Sticky Prices in the United States," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 90(6), pages 1187-1211, December.
    41. Van Nieuwerburgh, Stijn & Veldkamp, Laura, 2006. "Learning asymmetries in real business cycles," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 53(4), pages 753-772, May.
    42. Enrique G. Mendoza, 2010. "Sudden Stops, Financial Crises, and Leverage," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(5), pages 1941-1966, December.
    43. Sydney C. Ludvigson & Sai Ma & Serena Ng, 2021. "Uncertainty and Business Cycles: Exogenous Impulse or Endogenous Response?," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 13(4), pages 369-410, October.
    44. Lars Ljungqvist & Thomas J. Sargent, 2017. "The Fundamental Surplus," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 107(9), pages 2630-2665, September.
    45. Robert J. Hodrick, 2020. "An Exploration of Trend-Cycle Decomposition Methodologies in Simulated Data," NBER Working Papers 26750, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    46. Leduc, Sylvain & Liu, Zheng, 2016. "Uncertainty shocks are aggregate demand shocks," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 82(C), pages 20-35.
    47. repec:mcb:jmoncb:v:45:y:2013:i::p:535-558 is not listed on IDEAS
    48. Barnichon, Regis, 2010. "Building a composite Help-Wanted Index," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 109(3), pages 175-178, December.
    49. Andolfatto, David, 1996. "Business Cycles and Labor-Market Search," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 86(1), pages 112-132, March.
    50. Robert E. Hall, 2005. "Employment Fluctuations with Equilibrium Wage Stickiness," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(1), pages 50-65, March.
    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. Tyler Atkinson & Michael Plante & Alexander Richter & Nathaniel Throckmorton, 2022. "Complementarity and Macroeconomic Uncertainty," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 44, pages 225-243, April.
    2. Joshua Bernstein & Alexander W. Richter & Nathaniel A. Throckmorton, 2021. "Nonlinear Search and Matching Explained," Working Papers 2106, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.
    3. Bernstein, Joshua & Richter, Alexander W. & Throckmorton, Nathaniel A., 2021. "Cyclical net entry and exit," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 136(C).
    4. Alexander W. Richter & Nathaniel A. Throckmorton, 2017. "A New Way to Quantify the Effect of Uncertainty," Working Papers 1705, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.
    5. Joshua Bernstein & Alexander W. Richter & Nathaniel A. Throckmorton, 2020. "The Business Cycle Mechanics of Search and Matching Models," Working Papers 2026, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.
    6. Michael Plante & Alexander W. Richter & Nathaniel A. Throckmorton, 2018. "The Zero Lower Bound and Endogenous Uncertainty," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 128(611), pages 1730-1757, June.
    7. Valeriu Nalban & Andra Smadu, 2022. "Uncertainty shocks and the monetary-macroprudential policy mix," Working Papers 739, DNB.
    8. 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.
    9. Mumtaz, Haroon & Theodoridis, Konstantinos, 2020. "Dynamic effects of monetary policy shocks on macroeconomic volatility," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 114(C), pages 262-282.
    10. Rendahl, Pontus & Freund, Lukas B., 2020. "Unexpected Effects: Uncertainty, Unemployment, and Inflation," CEPR Discussion Papers 14690, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    11. Jesus Fernandez-Villaverde & Pablo Guerron-Quintana, 2020. "Uncertainty Shocks and Business Cycle Research," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 37, pages 118-166, August.
    12. Joshua Bernstein & Alexander W. Richter & Nathaniel A. Throckmorton, 2022. "The Matching Function and Nonlinear Business Cycles," Working Papers 2201, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.
    13. 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.
    14. Minchul Shin & Molin Zhong, 2020. "A New Approach to Identifying the Real Effects of Uncertainty Shocks," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 38(2), pages 367-379, April.
    15. Matteo Cacciatore & Federico Ravenna, 2021. "Uncertainty, Wages and the Business Cycle," The Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 131(639), pages 2797-2823.
    16. Leduc, Sylvain & Liu, Zheng, 2016. "Uncertainty shocks are aggregate demand shocks," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 82(C), pages 20-35.
    17. OH, Joonseok; ROGANTINI PICCO, Anna, 2019. "Macro uncertainty and unemployment risk," Economics Working Papers ECO 2019/02, European University Institute.
    18. Awijen, Haithem & Ben Zaied, Younes & Nguyen, Duc Khuong & Sensoy, Ahmet, 2020. "Endogenous Financial Uncertainty and Macroeconomic Volatility: Evidence from the United States," MPRA Paper 101276, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised Jun 2020.
    19. Alessandri, Piergiorgio & Mumtaz, Haroon, 2019. "Financial regimes and uncertainty shocks," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 101(C), pages 31-46.
    20. Mathias Krogh & Giovanni Pellegrino, "undated". "Real Activity and Uncertainty Shocks: The Long and the Short of It," "Marco Fanno" Working Papers 0310, Dipartimento di Scienze Economiche "Marco Fanno".

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Uncertainty Shocks; Endogenous Uncertainty; Variance Decomposition; Nonlinear;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C13 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric and Statistical Methods and Methodology: General - - - Estimation: General
    • D81 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Criteria for Decision-Making under Risk and Uncertainty
    • E32 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Business Fluctuations; Cycles
    • E37 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Forecasting and Simulation: Models and Applications
    • J64 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Mobility, Unemployment, Vacancies, and Immigrant Workers - - - Unemployment: Models, Duration, Incidence, and Job Search

    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:fip:feddwp:92899. 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: Amy Chapman (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/frbdaus.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.