IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/fip/fedfwp/2009-26.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Risk aversion, the labor margin, and asset pricing in DSGE models

Author

Listed:
  • Eric T. Swanson

Abstract

In dynamic stochastic general equilibrium (DSGE) models, the household's labor margin as well as consumption margin affects Arrow-Pratt risk aversion. This paper derives simple, closed-form expressions for risk aversion that take into account the household's labor margin. Ignoring the labor margin can lead to wildly inaccurate measures of the household's true attitudes toward risk. We show that risk premia on assets computed using the stochastic discount factor are proportional to Arrow-Pratt risk aversion, so that measuring risk aversion correctly is crucial for understanding asset prices. Closed-form expressions for risk aversion in DSGE models with generalized recursive preferences and internal and external habits are also derived.

Suggested Citation

  • Eric T. Swanson, 2009. "Risk aversion, the labor margin, and asset pricing in DSGE models," Working Paper Series 2009-26, Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco.
    • Handle: RePEc:fip:fedfwp:2009-26
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.frbsf.org/publications/economics/papers/2009/wp09-26bk.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Larry G. Epstein & Stanley E. Zin, 2013. "Substitution, risk aversion and the temporal behavior of consumption and asset returns: A theoretical framework," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Leonard C MacLean & William T Ziemba (ed.), HANDBOOK OF THE FUNDAMENTALS OF FINANCIAL DECISION MAKING Part I, chapter 12, pages 207-239, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    2. Boldrin, Michele & Christiano, Lawrence J. & Fisher, Jonas D.M., 1997. "Habit Persistence And Asset Returns In An Exchange Economy," Macroeconomic Dynamics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 1(2), pages 312-332, June.
    3. Rudebusch, Glenn D. & Swanson, Eric T., 2008. "Examining the bond premium puzzle with a DSGE model," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(Supplemen), pages 111-126, October.
    4. John Y. Campbell & John Cochrane, 1999. "Force of Habit: A Consumption-Based Explanation of Aggregate Stock Market Behavior," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 107(2), pages 205-251, April.
    5. TallariniJr., Thomas D., 2000. "Risk-sensitive real business cycles," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 45(3), pages 507-532, June.
    6. Weil, Philippe, 1989. "The equity premium puzzle and the risk-free rate puzzle," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 24(3), pages 401-421, November.
    7. Glenn D. Rudebusch & Eric T. Swanson, 2012. "The Bond Premium in a DSGE Model with Long-Run Real and Nominal Risks," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 4(1), pages 105-143, January.
    8. Benveniste, L M & Scheinkman, J A, 1979. "On the Differentiability of the Value Function in Dynamic Models of Economics," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 47(3), pages 727-732, May.
    9. Kihlstrom, Richard E. & Mirman, Leonard J., 1974. "Risk aversion with many commodities," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 8(3), pages 361-388, July.
    10. Lawrence J. Christiano & Michele Boldrin & Jonas D. M. Fisher, 2001. "Habit Persistence, Asset Returns, and the Business Cycle," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 91(1), pages 149-166, March.
    11. Constantinides, George M, 1990. "Habit Formation: A Resolution of the Equity Premium Puzzle," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 98(3), pages 519-543, June.
    12. Joseph E. Stiglitz, 1969. "A Note on Behavior towards Risk with Many Commodities," Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers 262, Cowles Foundation for Research in Economics, Yale University.
    13. King, Robert G. & Plosser, Charles I. & Rebelo, Sergio T., 1988. "Production, growth and business cycles : I. The basic neoclassical model," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 21(2-3), pages 195-232.
    14. Stiglitz, Joseph E, 1969. "Behavior Towards Risk with Many Commodities," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 37(4), pages 660-667, October.
    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. Gourio, François & Siemer, Michael & Verdelhan, Adrien, 2013. "International risk cycles," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 89(2), pages 471-484.
    2. Gourio, François, 2012. "Macroeconomic implications of time-varying risk premia," Working Paper Series 1463, European Central Bank.
    3. van Binsbergen, Jules H. & Fernández-Villaverde, Jesús & Koijen, Ralph S.J. & Rubio-Ramírez, Juan, 2012. "The term structure of interest rates in a DSGE model with recursive preferences," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 59(7), pages 634-648.
    4. Ferman, Marcelo, 2011. "Switching Monetary Policy Regimes and the Nominal Term Structure," Dynare Working Papers 5, CEPREMAP.
    5. Hakon Tretvoll, 2012. "Real exchange rate variability in a two country business cycle model," 2012 Meeting Papers 911, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    6. Bluwstein, Kristina & Yung, Julieta, 2019. "Back to the real economy: the effects of risk perception shocks on the term premium and bank lending," Bank of England working papers 806, Bank of England.

    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. Eric T. Swanson, 2020. "Implications of Labor Market Frictions for Risk Aversion and Risk Premia," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 12(2), pages 194-240, April.
    2. Eric Swanson, 2018. "Risk Aversion, Risk Premia, and the Labor Margin with Generalized Recursive Preferences," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 28, pages 290-321, April.
    3. Kliem, Martin & Uhlig, Harald, 2013. "Bayesian estimation of a DSGE model with asset prices," Discussion Papers 37/2013, Deutsche Bundesbank.
    4. Huh, Sungjun & Kim, Insu, 2021. "Real estate and relative risk aversion with generalized recursive preferences," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 68(C).
    5. Glenn D. Rudebusch & Eric T. Swanson, 2012. "The Bond Premium in a DSGE Model with Long-Run Real and Nominal Risks," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 4(1), pages 105-143, January.
    6. Jaccard, Ivan, 2018. "Stochastic discounting and the transmission of money supply shocks," Working Paper Series 2174, European Central Bank.
    7. Santiago Budría, 2008. "An Exploration of Asset Returns in a Production Economy with Relative Habits," Atlantic Economic Journal, Springer;International Atlantic Economic Society, vol. 36(3), pages 261-274, September.
    8. Eric Swanson, 2015. "A Macroeconomic Model of Equities and Real, Nominal, and Defaultable Debt," 2015 Meeting Papers 273, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    9. van Binsbergen, Jules H. & Fernández-Villaverde, Jesús & Koijen, Ralph S.J. & Rubio-Ramírez, Juan, 2012. "The term structure of interest rates in a DSGE model with recursive preferences," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 59(7), pages 634-648.
    10. François Gourio, 2013. "Credit Risk and Disaster Risk," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 5(3), pages 1-34, July.
    11. Hong Lan & Alexander Meyer-Gohde, 2013. "Decomposing Risk in Dynamic Stochastic General Equilibrium," SFB 649 Discussion Papers SFB649DP2013-022, Sonderforschungsbereich 649, Humboldt University, Berlin, Germany.
    12. Vincenzo Merella & Stephen E. Satchell, 2014. "Technology Shocks and Asset Pricing: The Role of Consumer Confidence," Carlo Alberto Notebooks 352, Collegio Carlo Alberto.
    13. Francois Gourio, 2012. "Disaster Risk and Business Cycles," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 102(6), pages 2734-2766, October.
    14. Martin M. Andreasen & Kasper Jørgensen, 2016. "Explaining Asset Prices with Low Risk Aversion and Low Intertemporal Substitution," CREATES Research Papers 2016-16, Department of Economics and Business Economics, Aarhus University.
    15. Kevin E. Beaubrun-Diant & Julien Matheron, 2008. "Rentabilités d'actifs et fluctuations économiques : une perspective d'équilibre général dynamique et stochastique," Economie & Prévision, La Documentation Française, vol. 0(2), pages 35-63.
    16. Isoré, Marlène & Szczerbowicz, Urszula, 2017. "Disaster risk and preference shifts in a New Keynesian model," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 79(C), pages 97-125.
    17. Christoffel, Kai & Kilponen, Juha & Jaccard, Ivan, 2011. "Government bond risk premia and the cyclicality of fiscal policy," Working Paper Series 1411, European Central Bank.
    18. Kihlstrom, Richard, 2009. "Risk aversion and the elasticity of substitution in general dynamic portfolio theory: Consistent planning by forward looking, expected utility maximizing investors," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 45(9-10), pages 634-663, September.
    19. Lorenzo Bretscher & Alex Hsu & Andrea Tamoni, 2023. "The Real Response to Uncertainty Shocks: The Risk Premium Channel," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 69(1), pages 119-140, January.
    20. Falato, Antonio, 2009. "Happiness maintenance and asset prices," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 33(6), pages 1247-1262, June.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Financial risk management; Asset pricing;

    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:fedfwp:2009-26. 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: Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco Research Library (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/frbsfus.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.