IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/fip/fednsr/172.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Tariffs and the Great Depression revisited

Author

Listed:
  • Mario J. Crucini
  • James A. Kahn

Abstract

Drawing on recent business cycle research on the Great Depression, we return to an argument we advanced in a 1996 article in the Journal of Monetary conomics - the argument that features of the Hawley-Smoot tariffs could have done more to decrease economic activity than is customarily believed, though not enough to account for the severe decline of the early 1930s. Here we reformulate our argument in a business cycle accounting framework that apportions fluctuations between three types of "wedges": (productive) inefficiency, the consumption-leisure margin, and intertemporal inefficiency. Tariff increases in our model correspond primarily to productive inefficiency in a prototype one-sector model. Moreover, the wedge implied by tariffs during the Depression correlates well with the overall measure of productive inefficiency. Our model fails to produce a labor wedge of any onsequence-persuasive evidence that factors other than tariffs also contributed significantly to the severity of the Depression.

Suggested Citation

  • Mario J. Crucini & James A. Kahn, 2003. "Tariffs and the Great Depression revisited," Staff Reports 172, Federal Reserve Bank of New York.
    • Handle: RePEc:fip:fednsr:172
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.newyorkfed.org/medialibrary/media/research/staff_reports/sr172.html
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.newyorkfed.org/medialibrary/media/research/staff_reports/sr172.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Fabrizio Perri & Vincenzo Quadrini, 2002. "The Great Depression in Italy: Trade Restrictions and Real Wage Rigidities," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 5(1), pages 128-151, January.
    2. Crucini, Mario J. & Kahn, James, 1996. "Tariffs and aggregate economic activity: Lessons from the Great Depression," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 38(3), pages 427-467, December.
    3. Hall, Robert E, 1997. "Macroeconomic Fluctuations and the Allocation of Time," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 15(1), pages 223-250, January.
    4. Casey B. Mulligan, 2002. "A Century of Labor-Leisure Distortions," NBER Working Papers 8774, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. Backus, David K & Kehoe, Patrick J, 1992. "International Evidence of the Historical Properties of Business Cycles," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 82(4), pages 864-888, September.
    6. Jordi Galí & Mark Gertler & J. David López-Salido, 2007. "Markups, Gaps, and the Welfare Costs of Business Fluctuations," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 89(1), pages 44-59, November.
    7. V. V. Chari & Patrick J. Kehoe & Ellen R. McGrattan, 2007. "Business Cycle Accounting," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 75(3), pages 781-836, May.
    8. Lee E. Ohanian, 2002. "Why did productivity fall so much during the Great Depression?," Quarterly Review, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, vol. 26(Spr).
    9. McDonald, Judith A. & O'Brien, Anthony Patrick & Callahan, Colleen M., 1997. "Trade Wars: Canada's Reaction to the Smoot-Hawley Tariff," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 57(4), pages 802-826, December.
    10. Rogerson, Richard, 1988. "Indivisible labor, lotteries and equilibrium," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 21(1), pages 3-16, January.
    11. Casey B. Mulligan, 2002. "A Dual Method of Empirically Evaluating Dynamic Competitive Equilibrium Models with Market Distortions, Applied to the Great Depression & World War II," NBER Working Papers 8775, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    12. Crucini, Mario J, 1994. "Sources of Variation in Real Tariff Rates: The United States, 1900-1940," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 84(3), pages 732-743, June.
    13. John Whalley, 1984. "Trade Liberalization among Major World Trading Areas," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262231204, December.
    14. Irwin, Douglas A. & Kroszner, Randall S., 1996. "Log-rolling and economic interests in the passage of the Smoot-Hawley tariff," Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 45(1), pages 173-200, December.
    15. Barry Eichengreen, 1986. "The Political Economy of the Smoot-Hawley Tariff," NBER Working Papers 2001, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    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. Kris James Mitchener & Kevin Hjortshøj O'Rourke & Kirsten Wandschneider, 2022. "The Smoot-Hawley Trade War," The Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 132(647), pages 2500-2533.
    2. Roman Sustek, 2011. "Monetary Business Cycle Accounting," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 14(4), pages 592-612, October.
    3. Naoussi, Claude Francis & Tripier, Fabien, 2013. "Trend shocks and economic development," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 103(C), pages 29-42.
    4. Paul Klein & Gustavo Ventura, 2018. "Taxation, Expenditures and the Irish Miracle," 2018 Meeting Papers 282, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    5. Bridji, Slim, 2013. "The French Great Depression: A business cycle accounting analysis," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 50(3), pages 427-445.
    6. Kris James Mitchener Author e-mail: kmitchener@scu.edu & Kirsten Wandschneider Author e-mail: kirsten.wandschneider@univie.ac.at & Kevin Hjortshøj O’Rourke Author e-mail: akevin.orourke@nyu.edu, 2021. "The Smoot-Hawley Trade War," Working Papers 20210061, New York University Abu Dhabi, Department of Social Science, revised Mar 2021.

    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. Crucini, Mario J. & Kahn, James, 1996. "Tariffs and aggregate economic activity: Lessons from the Great Depression," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 38(3), pages 427-467, December.
    2. Casey Mulligan, 2009. "What Caused the Recession of 2008? Hints from Labor Productivity," NBER Working Papers 14729, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Casey B. Mulligan, 2011. "Rising Labor Productivity during the 2008-9 Recession," NBER Working Papers 17584, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. V. V. Chari & Patrick J. Kehoe & Ellen R. McGrattan, 2007. "Business Cycle Accounting," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 75(3), pages 781-836, May.
    5. Jordi Galí & Mark Gertler & J. David López-Salido, 2007. "Markups, Gaps, and the Welfare Costs of Business Fluctuations," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 89(1), pages 44-59, November.
    6. Lawrence J. Christiano & Roberto Motto & Massimo Rostagno, 2003. "The Great Depression and the Friedman-Schwartz hypothesis," Proceedings, Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, pages 1119-1215.
    7. Nicola Acocella & Laura Bisio & Giovanni Di Bartolomeo & Alessandra Pelloni, "undated". "Labor market imperfections, real wage rigidities and financial shocks," Working Papers 80/11, Sapienza University of Rome, Metodi e Modelli per l'Economia, il Territorio e la Finanza MEMOTEF.
    8. Sungbae An & Yongsung Chang & Sun-Bin Kim, 2009. "Can a Representative-Agent Model Represent a Heterogeneous-Agent Economy," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 1(2), pages 29-54, July.
    9. Ohanian, Lee & Raffo, Andrea & Rogerson, Richard, 2008. "Long-term changes in labor supply and taxes: Evidence from OECD countries, 1956-2004," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(8), pages 1353-1362, November.
    10. Mark Bils & Peter J. Klenow & Benjamin A. Malin, 2018. "Resurrecting the Role of the Product Market Wedge in Recessions," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 108(4-5), pages 1118-1146, April.
    11. Lawrence J. Christiano & Joshua M. Davis, 2006. "Two flaws in business cycle dating," Working Papers (Old Series) 0612, Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland.
    12. Diego Comin & Mark Gertler, 2006. "Medium-Term Business Cycles," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 96(3), pages 523-551, June.
    13. Harold L. Cole & Lee E. Ohanian & Ron Leung, 2005. "Deflation and the International Great Depression: A Productivity Puzzle," NBER Working Papers 11237, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    14. Mark Weder, 2006. "Some Observations on the Great Depression in Germany," German Economic Review, Verein für Socialpolitik, vol. 7(1), pages 113-133, February.
    15. Ruy Lama, 2011. "Accounting for Output Drops in Latin America," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 14(2), pages 295-316, April.
    16. Lawrence J. Christiano & Joshua M. Davis, 2006. "Two flaws in business cycle accounting," Working Paper Series WP-06-10, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago.
    17. Rogerson, Richard & Shimer, Robert, 2011. "Search in Macroeconomic Models of the Labor Market," Handbook of Labor Economics, in: O. Ashenfelter & D. Card (ed.), Handbook of Labor Economics, edition 1, volume 4, chapter 7, pages Pages: 61, Elsevier.
    18. Peter Ireland & Scott Schuh, 2008. "Productivity and U.S. Macroeconomic Performance: Interpreting the Past and Predicting the Future with a Two-Sector Real Business Cycle Model," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 11(3), pages 473-492, July.
    19. Bridji, Slim, 2013. "The French Great Depression: A business cycle accounting analysis," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 50(3), pages 427-445.
    20. Loukas Karabarbounis, 2014. "The Labor Wedge: MRS vs. MPN," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 17(2), pages 206-223, April.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Depressions; Tariff;

    JEL classification:

    • F4 - International Economics - - Macroeconomic Aspects of International Trade and Finance
    • F13 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Trade Policy; International Trade Organizations

    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:fednsr:172. 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: Gabriella Bucciarelli (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/frbnyus.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.