IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/pra/mprapa/51277.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Economic Policy Uncertainty and Firm-Level Investment

Author

Listed:
  • Kang, Wensheng
  • Lee, Kiseok
  • Ratti, Ronald A.

Abstract

This paper examines the effect of economic policy uncertainty and its components on firm-level investment. It is found that economic policy uncertainty in interaction with firm-level uncertainty depresses firms’ investment decisions. When firms are in doubt about costs of doing business due to possible changes in regulation, cost of health care and taxes, they become more guarded with investment plans. The effect of economic policy uncertainty on firm-level investment is greater for firms with higher firm-level uncertainty and during a recession. News-based policy shock has a significantly negative long-term effect on firms’ investment. Federal expenditure forecast interquartile range shock has a significant negative effect in the short- and long-run. Policy uncertainty does not seem to influence the investment decisions of the very largest firms (about 20% of listed firms).

Suggested Citation

  • Kang, Wensheng & Lee, Kiseok & Ratti, Ronald A., 2013. "Economic Policy Uncertainty and Firm-Level Investment," MPRA Paper 51277, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    • Handle: RePEc:pra:mprapa:51277
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/51277/3/MPRA_paper_51277.pdf
    File Function: original version
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Hassett, Kevin A & Metcalf, Gilbert E, 1999. "Investment with Uncertain Tax Policy: Does Random Tax Policy Discourage Investment?," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 109(457), pages 372-393, July.
    2. Nicholas Bloom & Max Floetotto & Nir Jaimovich & Itay Saporta†Eksten & Stephen J. Terry, 2018. "Really Uncertain Business Cycles," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 86(3), pages 1031-1065, May.
    3. Christopher F. Baum & Mustafa Caglayan & Oleksandr Talavera, 2010. "On the sensitivity of firms' investment to cash flow and uncertainty," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 62(2), pages 286-306, April.
    4. Lubos Pástor & Pietro Veronesi, 2012. "Uncertainty about Government Policy and Stock Prices," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 67(4), pages 1219-1264, August.
    5. Krishna B. Kumar & Raghuram G. Rajan & Luigi Zingales, "undated". "What Determines Firm Size?," CRSP working papers 496, Center for Research in Security Prices, Graduate School of Business, University of Chicago.
    6. Paul Temple & Giovanni Urga & Ciaran Driver, 2001. "The Influence of Uncertainty on Investment in the UK: A Macro or Micro Phenomenon?," Scottish Journal of Political Economy, Scottish Economic Society, vol. 48(4), pages 361-382, September.
    7. Inessa Love, 2003. "Financial Development and Financing Constraints: International Evidence from the Structural Investment Model," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 16(3), pages 765-791, July.
    8. Guiseppe Bertola & Ricardo J. Caballero, 1994. "Irreversibility and Aggregate Investment," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 61(2), pages 223-246.
    9. Ben S. Bernanke, 1983. "Irreversibility, Uncertainty, and Cyclical Investment," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 98(1), pages 85-106.
    10. Jinzhu Chen & Prakash Kannan & Prakash Loungani & Bharat Trehan, 2012. "New evidence on cyclical and structural sources of unemployment," Proceedings, Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, issue March, pages 1-23.
    11. Jesús Fernández-Villaverde & Pablo Guerrón-Quintana & Keith Kuester & Juan Rubio-Ramírez, 2015. "Fiscal Volatility Shocks and Economic Activity," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 105(11), pages 3352-3384, November.
    12. David Roodman, 2009. "How to do xtabond2: An introduction to difference and system GMM in Stata," Stata Journal, StataCorp LP, vol. 9(1), pages 86-136, March.
    13. Luigi Guiso & Giuseppe Parigi, 1999. "Investment and Demand Uncertainty," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 114(1), pages 185-227.
    14. Avinash K. Dixit & Robert S. Pindyck, 1994. "Investment under Uncertainty," Economics Books, Princeton University Press, edition 1, number 5474.
    15. Leahy, John V & Whited, Toni M, 1996. "The Effect of Uncertainty on Investment: Some Stylized Facts," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 28(1), pages 64-83, February.
    16. Nick Bloom & Stephen Bond & John Van Reenen, 2007. "Uncertainty and Investment Dynamics," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 74(2), pages 391-415.
    17. Vlieghe, Gertjan & Stephen Bond & Alexander Klemm & Rain Newton-Smith & Murtaza Syed, 2003. "The roles of expected profitability, Tobin's Q and cash flow in econometric models of company investment," Royal Economic Society Annual Conference 2003 212, Royal Economic Society.
    18. Kevin A. Hassett, 1999. "Tax Policy and Investment," Books, American Enterprise Institute, number 53049, September.
    19. Born, Benjamin & Pfeifer, Johannes, 2014. "Policy risk and the business cycle," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 68(C), pages 68-85.
    20. Merton, Robert C., 1980. "On estimating the expected return on the market : An exploratory investigation," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 8(4), pages 323-361, December.
    21. Bontempi, Maria Elena & Golinelli, Roberto & Parigi, Giuseppe, 2010. "Why demand uncertainty curbs investment: Evidence from a panel of Italian manufacturing firms," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 32(1), pages 218-238, March.
    22. Rodrik, Dani, 1991. "Policy uncertainty and private investment in developing countries," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 36(2), pages 229-242, October.
    23. Andrew B. Abel & Janice C. Eberly, 1996. "Optimal Investment with Costly Reversibility," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 63(4), pages 581-593.
    24. Nicholas Bloom, 2009. "The Impact of Uncertainty Shocks," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 77(3), pages 623-685, May.
    25. Gianna Boero & Jeremy Smith & KennethF. Wallis, 2008. "Uncertainty and Disagreement in Economic Prediction: The Bank of England Survey of External Forecasters," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 118(530), pages 1107-1127, July.
    26. Blundell, Richard & Bond, Stephen, 1998. "Initial conditions and moment restrictions in dynamic panel data models," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 87(1), pages 115-143, August.
    27. Baum, Christopher F. & Caglayan, Mustafa & Talavera, Oleksandr, 2008. "Uncertainty determinants of firm investment," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 98(3), pages 282-287, March.
    28. Vasia Panousi & Dimitris Papanikolaou, 2012. "Investment, Idiosyncratic Risk, and Ownership," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 67(3), pages 1113-1148, June.
    29. Nicolas Bloom, 2000. "The dynamic effects of real options and irreversibility on investment and labour demand," IFS Working Papers W00/15, Institute for Fiscal Studies.
    30. Simon Gilchrist & Charles Himmelberg, 1999. "Investment: Fundamentals and Finance," NBER Chapters, in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 1998, volume 13, pages 223-274, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    31. Ciaran Driver & Katsushi Imai & Paul Temple & Giovanni Urga, 2004. "The effect of uncertainty on UK investment authorisation: Homogenous vs. heterogeneous estimators," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 29(1), pages 115-128, January.
    32. Kiseok Lee & Shawn Ni & Ronald A. Ratti, 1995. "Oil Shocks and the Macroeconomy: The Role of Price Variability," The Energy Journal, International Association for Energy Economics, vol. 0(Number 4), pages 39-56.
    33. Magda Bianco & Maria Bontempi & Roberto Golinelli & Giuseppe Parigi, 2013. "Family firms’ investments, uncertainty and opacity," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 40(4), pages 1035-1058, May.
    34. Giordani, Paolo & Soderlind, Paul, 2003. "Inflation forecast uncertainty," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 47(6), pages 1037-1059, December.
    35. Windmeijer, Frank, 1995. "A Note on R2 in the Instrumental Variables Model," MPRA Paper 102511, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    36. Arellano, Manuel & Bover, Olympia, 1995. "Another look at the instrumental variable estimation of error-components models," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 68(1), pages 29-51, July.
    37. Pagan, Adrian, 1984. "Econometric Issues in the Analysis of Regressions with Generated Regressors," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 25(1), pages 221-247, February.
    38. Byrne, Joseph P. & Davis, E. Philip, 2004. "Permanent and temporary inflation uncertainty and investment in the United States," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 85(2), pages 271-277, November.
    39. repec:bla:scotjp:v:48:y:2001:i:4:p:361-82 is not listed on IDEAS
    40. Romer, Paul M, 1990. "Endogenous Technological Change," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 98(5), pages 71-102, October.
    41. Rüdiger Bachmann & Christian Bayer, 2011. "Uncertainty Business Cycles - Really?," NBER Working Papers 16862, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    42. Ilona Babenko & Michael Lemmon & Yuri Tserlukevich, 2011. "Employee Stock Options and Investment," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 66(3), pages 981-1009, June.
    43. Robert Rich & Joseph Tracy, 2010. "The Relationships among Expected Inflation, Disagreement, and Uncertainty: Evidence from Matched Point and Density Forecasts," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 92(1), pages 200-207, February.
    44. Manuel Arellano & Stephen Bond, 1991. "Some Tests of Specification for Panel Data: Monte Carlo Evidence and an Application to Employment Equations," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 58(2), pages 277-297.
    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. Quader, Syed Manzur, 2023. "The interplay between uncertainty, managerial decision making, and firm value: Evidence from Bangladesh," Journal of Economics and Business, Elsevier, vol. 123(C).
    2. Marina Riem, 2016. "Corporate investment decisions under political uncertainty," ifo Working Paper Series 221, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich.
    3. Klaus Abberger & Andreas Dibiasi & Michael Siegenthaler & Jan-Egbert Sturm, 2016. "The Effect of Policy Uncertainty on Investment Plans," KOF Working papers 16-406, KOF Swiss Economic Institute, ETH Zurich.
    4. Klaus Abberger & Andreas Dibiasi & Michael Siegenthaler & Jan-Egbert Sturm, 2016. "The Effect of Policy Uncertainty on Investment Plans: Evidence from the Unexpected Acceptance of a Far-Reaching Referendum in Switzerland," CESifo Working Paper Series 5887, CESifo.
    5. Nick Bloom & Stephen Bond & John Van Reenen, 2007. "Uncertainty and Investment Dynamics," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 74(2), pages 391-415.
    6. Daniel Dejuán & Corinna Ghirelli, 2018. "Policy uncertainty and investment in Spain," Working Papers 1848, Banco de España.
    7. Caixe, Daniel Ferreira, 2022. "Corporate governance and investment sensitivity to policy uncertainty in Brazil," Emerging Markets Review, Elsevier, vol. 51(PB).
    8. Binding, Garret & Dibiasi, Andreas, 2017. "Exchange rate uncertainty and firm investment plans evidence from Swiss survey data," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 51(C), pages 1-27.
    9. Nina Biljanovska & Francesco Grigoli & Martina Hengge, 2021. "Fear thy neighbor: Spillovers from economic policy uncertainty," Review of International Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 29(2), pages 409-438, May.
    10. Nicholas Bloom & Max Floetotto & Nir Jaimovich & Itay Saporta†Eksten & Stephen J. Terry, 2018. "Really Uncertain Business Cycles," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 86(3), pages 1031-1065, May.
    11. Iván Alfaro & Nicholas Bloom & Xiaoji Lin, 2024. "The Finance Uncertainty Multiplier," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 132(2), pages 577-615.
    12. N. Bloom, 2016. "Fluctuations in uncertainty," Voprosy Ekonomiki, NP Voprosy Ekonomiki, issue 4.
    13. Chirinko, Robert S. & Schaller, Huntley, 2009. "The irreversibility premium," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 56(3), pages 390-408, April.
    14. Lee, Kiseok & Kang, Wensheng & Ratti, Ronald A., 2011. "Oil Price Shocks, Firm Uncertainty, And Investment," Macroeconomic Dynamics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 15(S3), pages 416-436, November.
    15. Li, Guangzhong & Li, Jie & Wu, Yangru, 2019. "Exchange rate uncertainty and firm-level investment: Finding the Hartman–Abel effect," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 47(2), pages 441-457.
    16. Maghyereh, Aktham & Abdoh, Hussein, 2020. "Asymmetric effects of oil price uncertainty on corporate investment," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 86(C).
    17. Daniel Dejuan-Bitria & Corinna Ghirelli, 2021. "Economic policy uncertainty and investment in Spain," SERIEs: Journal of the Spanish Economic Association, Springer;Spanish Economic Association, vol. 12(3), pages 351-388, September.
    18. Muhammad Arif Khan & Xuezhi Qin & Khalil Jebran & Abdul Rashid, 2020. "The Sensitivity of Firms’ Investment to Uncertainty and Cash Flow: Evidence From Listed State-Owned Enterprises and Non-State-Owned Enterprises in China," SAGE Open, , vol. 10(1), pages 21582440209, January.
    19. Luca Rossi, 2020. "Indicators of uncertainty: a brief user’s guide," Questioni di Economia e Finanza (Occasional Papers) 564, Bank of Italy, Economic Research and International Relations Area.
    20. Panagiotidis, Theodore & Printzis, Panagiotis, 2020. "What is the investment loss due to uncertainty?," Global Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 45(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Policy uncertainty; Firm investment; Stock price volatility;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • E22 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Investment; Capital; Intangible Capital; Capacity
    • E61 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Macroeconomic Policy, Macroeconomic Aspects of Public Finance, and General Outlook - - - Policy Objectives; Policy Designs and Consistency; Policy Coordination
    • G31 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - Capital Budgeting; Fixed Investment and Inventory Studies

    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:pra:mprapa:51277. 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: Joachim Winter (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/vfmunde.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.