IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/
MyIDEAS: Log in (now much improved!) to save this paper

Comment on Gali and Rabanal's "Technology shocks and aggregate fluctuations: how well does the RBC model fit postwar U.S. data?"

Author Info

Listed author(s):
  • Ellen R. McGrattan

Abstract

Gali and Rabanal provide statistical evidence that, in their view, puts into question the real business cycle paradigm in favor of the sticky-price paradigm. I demonstrate that their statistical procedure is easily misled in that they would reach the same conclusions even if their data had been simulated from an RBC model. I also demonstrate that sticky-price models do a poor job generating U.S.-like business cycles with only shocks to technology, the federal funds rate, and government consumption. This explains why Gali and Rabanal need large unobserved shocks to preferences and to the degree of monopoly power.

Download Info

If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the proper application to view it first. In case of further problems read the IDEAS help page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS site. Please be patient as the files may be large.

File URL: http://minneapolisfed.org/research/common/pub_detail.cfm?pb_autonum_id=903
Download Restriction: no
File URL: http://minneapolisfed.org/research/sr/sr338.pdf
Download Restriction: no

Paper provided by Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis in its series Staff Report with number 338.

as
in new window

Length:
Date of creation: 2004
Publication status: Published in NBER Macroeconomic Annual 2004> (Vol. 19, 2005, pp. 289-308)
Handle: RePEc:fip:fedmsr:338
Contact details of provider: Postal:
90 Hennepin Avenue, P.O. Box 291, Minneapolis, MN 55480-0291

Phone: (612) 204-5000
Web page: http://minneapolisfed.org/

More information through EDIRC

Order Information: Web: http://www.minneapolisfed.org/pubs/

Keywords: Business cycles - Econometric models ; Technological innovations;

This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

References listed on IDEAS
Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:

as
in new window


  1. Runkle, David E, 1987. "Vector Autoregressions and Reality," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 5(4), pages 437-442, October.
  2. Lippi, Marco & Reichlin, Lucrezia, 1993. "The Dynamic Effects of Aggregate Demand and Supply Disturbances: Comment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 83(3), pages 644-652, June.
  3. Blanchard, Olivier Jean & Quah, Danny, 1989. "The Dynamic Effects of Aggregate Demand and Supply Disturbances," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 79(4), pages 655-673, September.
  4. Runkle, David E, 1987. "Vector Autoregressions and Reality: Reply," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 5(4), pages 454-454, October.
  5. V. V. Chari & Patrick J. Kehoe & Ellen R. McGrattan, 2000. "Sticky Price Models of the Business Cycle: Can the Contract Multiplier Solve the Persistence Problem?," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 68(5), pages 1151-1180, September.
  6. Uhlig, Harald, 2005. "What are the effects of monetary policy on output? Results from an agnostic identification procedure," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 52(2), pages 381-419, March.
  7. Ellen R. McGrattan, 2001. "Predicting the effects of Federal Reserve policy in a sticky price model: an analytical approach," Proceedings, Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, issue Jun.
  8. Christopher J. Erceg & Luca Guerrieri & Christopher Gust, 2005. "Can Long-Run Restrictions Identify Technology Shocks?," Journal of the European Economic Association, MIT Press, vol. 3(6), pages 1237-1278, December.
  9. David E. Runkle, 1987. "Vector autoregressions and reality," Staff Report 107, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis.
  10. Richard Clarida & Jordi Galí & Mark Gertler, 2000. "Monetary Policy Rules and Macroeconomic Stability: Evidence and Some Theory," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 115(1), pages 147-180.
  11. Neville Francis & Valerie A. Ramey, 2002. "Is the Technology-Driven Real Business Cycle Hypothesis Dead?," NBER Working Papers 8726, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  12. Julio Rotemberg & Michael Woodford, 1997. "An Optimization-Based Econometric Framework for the Evaluation of Monetary Policy," NBER Chapters,in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 1997, Volume 12, pages 297-361 National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  13. V. V Chari & Patrick J. Kehoe & Ellen R. McGrattan, 2002. "Can Sticky Price Models Generate Volatile and Persistent Real Exchange Rates?," Review of Economic Studies, Oxford University Press, vol. 69(3), pages 533-563.
  14. Kydland, Finn E & Prescott, Edward C, 1982. "Time to Build and Aggregate Fluctuations," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 50(6), pages 1345-1370, November.
  15. McGrattan, Ellen R., 1994. "The macroeconomic effects of distortionary taxation," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 33(3), pages 573-601, June.
  16. Faust, Jon & Leeper, Eric M, 1997. "When Do Long-Run Identifying Restrictions Give Reliable Results?," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 15(3), pages 345-353, July.
  17. Stephen L. Parente & Edward C. Prescott, 2002. "Barriers to Riches," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262661306, July.
  18. Gamber, Edward N & Joutz, Frederick L, 1993. "The Dynamic Effects of Aggregate Demand and Supply Disturbances: Comment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 83(5), pages 1387-1393, December.
  19. Cooley, Thomas F. & Dwyer, Mark, 1998. "Business cycle analysis without much theory A look at structural VARs," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 83(1-2), pages 57-88.
Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.

as
in new window


Cited by:

  1. Alejandro Justiniano & Claudio Michelacci, 2012. "The Cyclical Behavior of Equilibrium Unemployment and Vacancies in the United States and Europe," NBER International Seminar on Macroeconomics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 8(1), pages 169-235.
  2. Dedola, Luca & Neri, Stefano, 2007. "What does a technology shock do? A VAR analysis with model-based sign restrictions," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 54(2), pages 512-549, March.
  3. Luis Eduardo Arango & Nataly Obando & Carlos Esteban Posada, 2011. "Los salarios reales a lo largo del ciclo económico en Colombia," Borradores de Economia 666, Banco de la Republica de Colombia.
  4. Federico S. Mandelman & Francesco Zanetti, 2008. "Technology shocks, employment, and labor market frictions," FRB Atlanta Working Paper 2008-10, Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta.
  5. Ellen R. McGrattan & Edward C. Prescott, 2005. "Expensed and sweat equity," Working Papers 636, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis.
  6. Marianna Riggi, 2010. "Nominal And Real Wage Rigidities In New Keynesian Models: A Critical Survey," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 24(3), pages 539-572, 07.

This item is not listed on Wikipedia, on a reading list or among the top items on IDEAS.

Access and download statistics

When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:fip:fedmsr:338. 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: (Jannelle Ruswick)

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 references are entirely missing, you can add them using this form.

If the full references list an item that is present in RePEc, but the system did not link 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 profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

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

This information is provided to you by IDEAS at the Research Division of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis using RePEc data.