IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/pra/mprapa/72787.html

Gray's Anatomy: Understanding Uncertainty

Author

Listed:
  • Samaniego, Roberto
  • Sun, Juliana

Abstract

We explore the key mechanisms whereby uncertainty impacts the business cycle by exploring the interaction of uncertainty with growth in industries with different technologies of production. We find that uncertainty shocks are particularly detrimental to growth in industries with rapid capital depreciation or high investment adjustment costs. The findings are consistent with real options theory: uncertainty leads firms to delay investment in new projects, but high depreciation and fixed costs of investment make delay more costly. On the other hand, we do not find evidence of a significant role of financial markets in the generation nor propagation of uncertainty shocks.

Suggested Citation

  • Samaniego, Roberto & Sun, Juliana, 2016. "Gray's Anatomy: Understanding Uncertainty," MPRA Paper 72787, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    • Handle: RePEc:pra:mprapa:72787
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/72787/1/MPRA_paper_72787.pdf
    File Function: original version
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Andrea Lanteri, 2018. "The Market for Used Capital: Endogenous Irreversibility and Reallocation over the Business Cycle," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 108(9), pages 2383-2419, September.
    2. N. Bloom, 2016. "Fluctuations in uncertainty," Voprosy Ekonomiki, NP Voprosy Ekonomiki, issue 4.
    3. James E. Anderson & Eric van Wincoop, 2004. "Trade Costs," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 42(3), pages 691-751, September.
    4. Samaniego, Roberto M. & Sun, Juliana Y., 2015. "Technology and contractions: evidence from manufacturing," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 79(C), pages 172-195.
    5. Alejandro Justiniano & Giorgio Primiceri & Andrea Tambalotti, 2011. "Investment Shocks and the Relative Price of Investment," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 14(1), pages 101-121, January.
    6. Nathan Nunn, 2007. "Relationship-Specificity, Incomplete Contracts, and the Pattern of Trade," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 122(2), pages 569-600.
    7. Greenwood, Jeremy & Hercowitz, Zvi & Krusell, Per, 2000. "The role of investment-specific technological change in the business cycle," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 44(1), pages 91-115, January.
    8. Jae Sim & Egon Zakrajsek & Simon Gilchrist, 2010. "Uncertainty, Financial Frictions, and Investment Dynamics," 2010 Meeting Papers 1285, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    9. Caldara, Dario & Fuentes-Albero, Cristina & Gilchrist, Simon & Zakrajšek, Egon, 2016. "The macroeconomic impact of financial and uncertainty shocks," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 88(C), pages 185-207.
    10. Scott R. Baker & Nicholas Bloom, 2013. "Does Uncertainty Reduce Growth? Using Disasters as Natural Experiments," NBER Working Papers 19475, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    11. Roberto M. Samaniego, 2010. "Entry, Exit, and Investment-Specific Technical Change," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(1), pages 164-192, March.
    12. Rajan, Raghuram G & Zingales, Luigi, 1998. "Financial Dependence and Growth," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 88(3), pages 559-586, June.
    13. Jensen, Michael C. & Meckling, William H., 1976. "Theory of the firm: Managerial behavior, agency costs and ownership structure," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 3(4), pages 305-360, October.
    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. Ilyina, Anna & Samaniego, Roberto, 2012. "Structural change and financing constraints," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 59(2), pages 166-179.
    16. Jeffrey Campbell, 1998. "Entry, Exit, Embodied Technology, and Business Cycles," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 1(2), pages 371-408, April.
    17. 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.
    18. Marianne Bertrand & Esther Duflo & Sendhil Mullainathan, 2004. "How Much Should We Trust Differences-In-Differences Estimates?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 119(1), pages 249-275.
    19. Justiniano, Alejandro & Primiceri, Giorgio E. & Tambalotti, Andrea, 2010. "Investment shocks and business cycles," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 57(2), pages 132-145, March.
    20. Roberto M. Samaniego, 2008. "Entry, Exit and Business Cycles in a General Equilibrium Model," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 11(3), pages 529-541, July.
    21. Calvo, Guillermo A., 1983. "Staggered prices in a utility-maximizing framework," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 12(3), pages 383-398, September.
    22. Avinash K. Dixit & Robert S. Pindyck, 1994. "Investment under Uncertainty," Economics Books, Princeton University Press, edition 1, number 5474.
    23. Kiyotaki, Nobuhiro & Moore, John, 1997. "Credit Cycles," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 105(2), pages 211-248, April.
    24. Anna Ilyina & Roberto Samaniego, 2011. "Technology and Financial Development," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 43(5), pages 899-921, August.
    25. Marcelo L. Veracierto, 2002. "Plant-Level Irreversible Investment and Equilibrium Business Cycles," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 92(1), pages 181-197, March.
    26. Roberto Samaniego & Juliana Sun, 2016. "Productivity Growth and Structural Transformation," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 21, pages 266-285, July.
    27. Scott R. Baker & Nicholas Bloom & Steven J. Davis, 2016. "Measuring Economic Policy Uncertainty," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 131(4), pages 1593-1636.
    28. Mark E. Doms & Timothy Dunne, 1998. "Capital Adjustment Patterns in Manufacturing Plants," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 1(2), pages 409-429, April.
    29. Kraft, Holger & Schwartz, Eduardo S. & Weiss, Farina, 2017. "Growth options and firm valuation," SAFE Working Paper Series 6, Leibniz Institute for Financial Research SAFE, revised 2017.
    30. John Haltiwanger & Russell Cooper & Laura Power, 1999. "Machine Replacement and the Business Cycle: Lumps and Bumps," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 89(4), pages 921-946, September.
    31. Holger Kraft & Eduardo S. Schwartz & Farina Weiss, 2013. "Growth Options and Firm Valuation," NBER Working Papers 18836, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    32. 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.
    33. Hartman, Richard, 1972. "The effects of price and cost uncertainty on investment," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 5(2), pages 258-266, October.
    34. Greenwood, Jeremy & Hercowitz, Zvi & Huffman, Gregory W, 1988. "Investment, Capacity Utilization, and the Real Business Cycle," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 78(3), pages 402-417, June.
    35. Luc Laeven & Fabian Valencia, 2020. "Systemic Banking Crises Database II," IMF Economic Review, Palgrave Macmillan;International Monetary Fund, vol. 68(2), pages 307-361, June.
    36. Nancy Stokey, 2016. "Wait-and See: Investment Options under Policy Uncertainty," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 21, pages 246-265, July.
    37. Oliver Hart & John Moore, 1994. "A Theory of Debt Based on the Inalienability of Human Capital," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 109(4), pages 841-879.
    38. Abel, Andrew B, 1983. "Optimal Investment under Uncertainty," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 73(1), pages 228-233, March.
    39. Toshihiko Mukoyama & Yoonsoo Lee, 2008. "Entry, Exit, and Plant-level Dynamics over the Business Cycle," 2008 Meeting Papers 454, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    40. Mulligan, C. B. & Sala-i-Martin, X., 1997. "A labor income-based measure of the value of human capital: An application to the states of the United States," Japan and the World Economy, Elsevier, vol. 9(2), pages 159-191, May.
    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. Sangyup Choi & Davide Furceri & João Tovar Jalles, 2017. "Fiscal Stabilization and Growth: Evidence from Industry-level Data for Advanced and Developing Economies," IMF Working Papers 2017/198, International Monetary Fund.

    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. Samaniego, Roberto M. & Sun, Juliana Y., 2019. "Uncertainty, depreciation and industry growth," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 120(C).
    2. Samaniego, Roberto M. & Sun, Juliana Y., 2015. "Technology and contractions: evidence from manufacturing," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 79(C), pages 172-195.
    3. Nadav Ben Zeev, 2019. "Is There A Single Shock That Drives The Majority Of Business Cycle Fluctuations?," Working Papers 1906, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Department of Economics.
    4. Stijn Claessens & M Ayhan Kose, 2018. "Frontiers of macrofinancial linkages," BIS Papers, Bank for International Settlements, number 95.
    5. Ding, Yibing & Liu, Ziyu & Liu, Dayu, 2022. "Structural news shock, financial market uncertainty and China's business fluctuations," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 76(C).
    6. Jesus Fernandez-Villaverde & Pablo Guerron-Quintana, 2020. "Uncertainty Shocks and Business Cycle Research," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 37, pages 118-166, August.
    7. Dibiasi, Andreas & Abberger, Klaus & Siegenthaler, Michael & Sturm, Jan-Egbert, 2018. "The effects of policy uncertainty on investment: Evidence from the unexpected acceptance of a far-reaching referendum in Switzerland," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 104(C), pages 38-67.
    8. Shinohara, Takeshi & Okuda, Tatsushi & Nakajima, Jouchi, 2021. "Characteristics of Uncertainty Indices in the Macroeconomy," Economic Review, Hitotsubashi University, vol. 72(3), pages 246-267, July.
    9. Can Xu & Andreas Steiner & Jakob Haan, 2025. "Does uncertainty matter for private credit convergence?," Review of World Economics (Weltwirtschaftliches Archiv), Springer;Institut für Weltwirtschaft (Kiel Institute for the World Economy), vol. 161(3), pages 1071-1112, August.
    10. N. Bloom, 2016. "Fluctuations in uncertainty," Voprosy Ekonomiki, NP Voprosy Ekonomiki, issue 4.
    11. Yadav, Jayant, 2020. "Flight to Safety in Business cycles," MPRA Paper 104093, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    12. Panagiotidis, Theodore & Printzis, Panagiotis, 2020. "What is the investment loss due to uncertainty?," Global Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 45(C).
    13. Carlos Cañizares Martínez & Arne Gieseck, 2025. "The effects of macro uncertainty shocks in the euro area: a FAVAR approach," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 68(6), pages 2829-2872, June.
    14. Ambrogio Cesa-Bianchi & Emilio Fernandez-Corugedo, 2014. "Uncertainty in a model with credit frictions," Bank of England working papers 496, Bank of England.
    15. Helmut Herwartz & Alexander Lange, 2024. "How certain are we about the role of uncertainty in the economy?," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 62(1), pages 126-149, January.
    16. Bhanu Pratap & Nalin Priyaranjan, 2023. "Macroeconomic effects of uncertainty: a Google trends-based analysis for India," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 65(4), pages 1599-1625, October.
    17. Boyan Jovanovic & Sai Ma, 2022. "Uncertainty and Growth Disasters," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 44, pages 33-64, April.
    18. 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.
    19. Taylor, Mark P. & Wang, Zigan & Xu, Qi, 2021. "The real effects of exchange rate risk on corporate investment: International evidence," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 117(C).
    20. Andrés Blanco & Isaac Baley, 2022. "The Macroeconomics of Irreversibility," Working Papers 1312, Barcelona School of Economics.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    JEL classification:

    • D81 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Criteria for Decision-Making under Risk and Uncertainty
    • E22 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Investment; Capital; Intangible Capital; Capacity
    • E32 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Business Fluctuations; Cycles

    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:72787. 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.