IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/nbr/nberwo/0888.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Time-Separable Preference and Intertemporal-Substitution Models of Business Cycles

Author

Listed:
  • Robert J. Barro
  • Robert G. King

Abstract

Time-separability of utility means that past work and consumption do not influence current and future tastes. This form of preferences does not restrict the size of intertemporal-substitution effects--notably, we can still have a strong response of labor supply to temporary changes in wages. However, there are important constraints on the relative responses of leisure and consumption to changes in relative-price and in permanent income. When the usual aggregation is permissible, time-separability has some important implications for equilibrium theories of the business cycle. Neglecting investment, we, find that changes in perceptions about the future -- which night appear currently as income effects -- have no influence on current equilibrium output. With investment included, no combination of income effects and shifts to the perceived profitability of investment will yield positive co-movements of output, employment, investment and consumption. Therefore, misperceived monetary disturbances or other sources of changed beliefs about the future cannot be used to generate empirically recognizable business cycles. Some richer specifications of intertemporal production opportunities may eventually yield more satisfactory answers. Because of the positive correlation between cyclical movements of consumption and work, equilibrium theories with time-separable preferences inevitably predict a procyclical behavior for the real wage rate, arising from shifts to labor's marginal product. Empirically, we regard the cyclical behavior of real wages as an open question. Aside from analyzing autonomous real shocks to productivity, we suggest that such shifts may occur as firms vary their capital utilization in response to intertemporal relative prices. However, we still lack some parts of a complete theory.

Suggested Citation

  • Robert J. Barro & Robert G. King, 1982. "Time-Separable Preference and Intertemporal-Substitution Models of Business Cycles," NBER Working Papers 0888, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:0888
    Note: EFG
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.nber.org/papers/w0888.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Hall, Robert E, 1978. "Stochastic Implications of the Life Cycle-Permanent Income Hypothesis: Theory and Evidence," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 86(6), pages 971-987, December.
    2. Grossman, Herschel I, 1973. "Aggregate Demand, Job Search, and Employment," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 81(6), pages 1353-1369, Nov.-Dec..
    3. Milton Friedman, 1957. "A Theory of the Consumption Function," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number frie57-1, July.
    4. MaCurdy, Thomas E, 1981. "An Empirical Model of Labor Supply in a Life-Cycle Setting," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 89(6), pages 1059-1085, December.
    5. Long, John B, Jr & Plosser, Charles I, 1983. "Real Business Cycles," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 91(1), pages 39-69, February.
    6. Barro, Robert J., 1976. "Rational expectations and the role of monetary policy," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 2(1), pages 1-32, January.
    7. Lucas, Robert Jr., 1972. "Expectations and the neutrality of money," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 4(2), pages 103-124, April.
    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. Casey B. Mulligan, 1999. "Substitution over Time: Another Look at Life-Cycle Labor Supply," NBER Chapters, in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 1998, volume 13, pages 75-152, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Goutsmedt, Aurélien & Truc, Alexandre, 2023. "An independent European macroeconomics? A history of European macroeconomics through the lens of the European Economic Review," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 158(C).
    3. Tolar, Martin Michael, 1997. "A behavioral model of nondurable consumption expenditure," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 26(3), pages 291-302.
    4. Froyen, Richard T & Waud, Roger N, 1988. "Real Business Cycles and the Lucas Paradigm," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 26(2), pages 183-201, April.
    5. Lars Lochstoer & Harjoat S. Bhamra, 2009. "Return Predictability and Labor Market Frictions in a Real Business Cycle Model," 2009 Meeting Papers 1257, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    6. Akhand Akhtar Hossain, 2009. "Central Banking and Monetary Policy in the Asia-Pacific," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 12777.
    7. Jan-Oliver Menz, 2010. "Uncertainty, social norms and consumption theory: Post and New Keynesian approaches," European Journal of Economics and Economic Policies: Intervention, Edward Elgar Publishing, vol. 7(1), pages 125-146.
    8. David Staines, 2023. "Stochastic Equilibrium the Lucas Critique and Keynesian Economics," Papers 2312.16214, arXiv.org.
    9. Willem H. Buiter, 2003. "James Tobin: An Appreciation of his Contribution to Economics," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 113(491), pages 585-631, November.
    10. Goodfriend, Marvin S. & King, Robert G., 1981. "A note on the neutrality of temporary monetary disturbances," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 7(3), pages 371-385.
    11. Robert H. Topel & Finis Welch, 1986. "Efficient Labor Contracts with Employment Risk," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 17(4), pages 490-507, Winter.
    12. Alessie, R.J.M. & Kapteyn, A.J., 1986. "Consumption, savings and demography," Research Memorandum FEW 238, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    13. John Foster, 2021. "The US consumption function: a new perspective," Journal of Evolutionary Economics, Springer, vol. 31(3), pages 773-798, July.
    14. Farmer, Roger E.A., 2016. "The Evolution Of Endogenous Business Cycles," Macroeconomic Dynamics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 20(2), pages 544-557, March.
    15. Chollete, Loran & Ning, Cathy, 2009. "The Dependence Structure of Macroeconomic Variables in the US," UiS Working Papers in Economics and Finance 2009/31, University of Stavanger.
    16. McCallum, Bennett T., 1990. "Inflation: Theory and evidence," Handbook of Monetary Economics, in: B. M. Friedman & F. H. Hahn (ed.), Handbook of Monetary Economics, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 18, pages 963-1012, Elsevier.
    17. Antoine d'Autume, 1986. "Les anticipations rationnelles dans l'analyse macro-économique," Revue Économique, Programme National Persée, vol. 37(2), pages 243-284.
    18. Etro, Federico, 2017. "Research in economics and macroeconomics," Research in Economics, Elsevier, vol. 71(3), pages 373-383.
    19. Kohei Kubota & Mototsugu Fukushige, 2016. "Rational Consumers," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 57(1), pages 231-254, February.
    20. Lucas, Jr., Robert E., 1995. "Monetary Neutrality," Nobel Prize in Economics documents 1995-1, Nobel Prize Committee.

    More about this item

    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:nbr:nberwo:0888. 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: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/nberrus.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.