IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/fip/fedhwp/wp-06-27.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Welfare implications of the transition to high household debt

Author

Listed:
  • Jeffrey R. Campbell
  • Zvi Hercowitz

Abstract

Aggressive deregulation of the mortgage market in the early 1980s triggered innovations that greatly reduced the required home equity of U.S. households. This allowed households to cash-out a large part of accumulated equity, which equaled 71 percent of GDP in 1982. A borrowing surge followed: Household debt increased from 43 to 62 percent of GDP in the 1982- 2000 period. What are the welfare implications of such a reform for borrowers and savers? This paper uses a calibrated general equilibrium model of lending from the wealthy to the middle class to evaluate these effects quantitatively.

Suggested Citation

  • Jeffrey R. Campbell & Zvi Hercowitz, 2006. "Welfare implications of the transition to high household debt," Working Paper Series WP-06-27, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago.
    • Handle: RePEc:fip:fedhwp:wp-06-27
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.chicagofed.org/digital_assets/publications/working_papers/2006/wp2006_27.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Zvi Hercowitz & Jeffrey C. Campbell, 2005. "The Role of Collateralized Household Debt in Macroeconomic Stabilization," 2005 Meeting Papers 120, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    2. Fair, Ray C & Taylor, John B, 1983. "Solution and Maximum Likelihood Estimation of Dynamic Nonlinear Rational Expectations Models," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 51(4), pages 1169-1185, July.
    3. Benjamin M. Friedman, 1992. "Learning From the Reagan Deficits," NBER Working Papers 4022, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. John Laitner, 2001. "Wealth Accumulation in the U.S.: Do Inheritances and Bequests Play a Significant Role?," Working Papers wp019, University of Michigan, Michigan Retirement Research Center.
    5. Nobuhiro Kiyotaki, 1998. "Credit and Business Cycles," The Japanese Economic Review, Japanese Economic Association, vol. 49(1), pages 18-35, March.
    6. Richard K. Green & Susan M. Wachter, 2005. "The American Mortgage in Historical and International Context," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 19(4), pages 93-114, Fall.
    7. Friedman, Benjamin M, 1992. "Learning from the Reagan Deficits," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 82(2), pages 299-304, May.
    8. Dirk Krueger & Fabrizio Perri, 2006. "Does Income Inequality Lead to Consumption Inequality? Evidence and Theory -super-1," Review of Economic Studies, Oxford University Press, vol. 73(1), pages 163-193.
    9. Fernando Alvarez & Urban J. Jermann, 2000. "Efficiency, Equilibrium, and Asset Pricing with Risk of Default," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 68(4), pages 775-798, July.
    10. Per Krusell & Anthony A. Smith & Jr., 1998. "Income and Wealth Heterogeneity in the Macroeconomy," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 106(5), pages 867-896, October.
    11. Smith Jr., Anthony A., 2009. "Comment on: "Welfare implications of the transition to high household debt" by Campbell and Hercowitz," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 56(1), pages 17-19, January.
    12. Robert A. Becker, 1980. "On the Long-Run Steady State in a Simple Dynamic Model of Equilibrium with Heterogeneous Households," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 95(2), pages 375-382.
    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. Jeffrey R. Campbell & Zvi Hercowitz, 2006. "The macroeconomic transition to high household debt," Proceedings, Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, issue Nov.
    2. Jeffrey R. Campbell & Zvi Hercowitz, 2010. "Interest rates following financial re-regulation," Economic Perspectives, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, vol. 34(Q I), pages 2-13.
    3. Matteo Iacoviello, 2008. "Household Debt and Income Inequality, 1963–2003," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 40(5), pages 929-965, August.
    4. Tommaso Monacelli & Roberto Perotti, 2011. "Tax Cuts, Redistribution, and Borrowing Constraints," Working Papers 408, IGIER (Innocenzo Gasparini Institute for Economic Research), Bocconi University.
    5. Iacoviello, Matteo & Pavan, Marina, 2013. "Housing and debt over the life cycle and over the business cycle," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 60(2), pages 221-238.
    6. Ester Faia, 2011. "Macroeconomic and welfare implications of financial globalization," Journal of Applied Economics, Universidad del CEMA, vol. 14, pages 119-144, May.
    7. Tommaso Monacelli & Roberto Perotti, 2011. "Redistribution and the Multiplier," IMF Economic Review, Palgrave Macmillan;International Monetary Fund, vol. 59(4), pages 630-651, November.
    8. Florin O. Bilbiie & Tommaso Monacelli & Roberto Perotti, 2013. "Public Debt and Redistribution with Borrowing Constraints," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 0, pages 64-98, February.
    9. Ábrahám, Árpád & Cárceles-Poveda, Eva, 2010. "Endogenous trading constraints with incomplete asset markets," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 145(3), pages 974-1004, May.
    10. Ester Faia & Eleni Iliopulos, 2010. "Financial Globalization, Financial Frictions and Optimal Monetary Policy," Université Paris1 Panthéon-Sorbonne (Post-Print and Working Papers) halshs-00497486, HAL.
    11. Dirk Krueger, 2006. "Public Insurance against Idiosyncratic and Aggregate Risk: The Case of Social Security and Progressive Income Taxation," CESifo Economic Studies, CESifo, vol. 52(4), pages 587-620, December.
    12. Broer, Tobias, 2020. "Consumption insurance over the business cycle," CEPR Discussion Papers 14579, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    13. Tobias Broer, 2009. "Stationary equilibrium distributions in economies with limited commitment," Economics Working Papers ECO2009/39, European University Institute.
    14. Monacelli, Tommaso, 2009. "New Keynesian models, durable goods, and collateral constraints," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 56(2), pages 242-254, March.
    15. Röhrs, Sigrid & Winter, Christoph, 2015. "Public versus private provision of liquidity: Is there a trade-off?," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 53(C), pages 314-339.
    16. Tommaso Monacelli, 2008. "Optimal Monetary Policy with Collateralized Household Debt and Borrowing Constraints," NBER Chapters, in: Asset Prices and Monetary Policy, pages 103-146, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    17. Timothy Cogley & Thomas J. Sargent & Viktor Tsyrennikov, 2014. "Wealth Dynamics in a Bond Economy with Heterogeneous Beliefs," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 124(575), pages 1-30, March.
    18. Richard M. H. Suen, 2014. "Time Preference And The Distributions Of Wealth And Income," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 52(1), pages 364-381, January.
    19. Vlieghe, Gertjan W, 2007. "Imperfect credit markets: implications for monetary policy," MPRA Paper 12957, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    20. Grochulski, Borys & Zhang, Yuzhe, 2011. "Optimal risk sharing and borrowing constraints in a continuous-time model with limited commitment," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 146(6), pages 2356-2388.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Debt; Mortgage loans; Welfare;
    All these keywords.

    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:fedhwp:wp-06-27. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: . General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/frbchus.html .

    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: Lauren Wiese (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/frbchus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service hosted by the Research Division of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis . RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.