IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ucn/wpaper/201729.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Labor Market Frictions, Investment and Capital Flows

Author

Listed:
  • Clemens C. Struck

Abstract

The standard neoclassical model predicts that countries with higher productivity growth rates experience sharp increases in investment that are followed by rapid declines. This investment response contrasts with the empirical evidence that suggests a rather hump-shaped investment behavior. In this paper, I present a two-country general equilibrium model that generates hump-shaped investment responses from labor market frictions. In the model, I decompose investment into tradable and non-tradable components and show that an increase in the growth rate of a country results in scarcities of the non-tradable components which raise the relative price of investment goods. These scarcities occur because labor is unable to reallocate quickly between sectors within economies.

Suggested Citation

  • Clemens C. Struck, 2017. "Labor Market Frictions, Investment and Capital Flows," Working Papers 201729, School of Economics, University College Dublin.
    • Handle: RePEc:ucn:wpaper:201729
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10197/9442
    File Function: First version, 2017
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Backus, David K & Kehoe, Patrick J & Kydland, Finn E, 1994. "Dynamics of the Trade Balance and the Terms of Trade: The J-Curve?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 84(1), pages 84-103, March.
    2. Schmitt-Grohe, Stephanie & Uribe, Martin, 2003. "Closing small open economy models," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 61(1), pages 163-185, October.
    3. Enrique G. Mendoza, 2007. "Financial Integration, Financial Deepness and Global Imbalance," 2007 Meeting Papers 746, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    4. Nicolas Coeurdacier & Stéphane Guibaud & Keyu Jin, 2015. "Credit Constraints and Growth in a Global Economy," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 105(9), pages 2838-2881, September.
    5. Mark Aguiar & Gita Gopinath, 2007. "Emerging Market Business Cycles: The Cycle Is the Trend," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 115(1), pages 69-102.
    6. Stockman, Alan C & Tesar, Linda L, 1995. "Tastes and Technology in a Two-Country Model of the Business Cycle: Explaining International Comovements," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 85(1), pages 168-185, March.
    7. Neumeyer, Pablo A. & Perri, Fabrizio, 2005. "Business cycles in emerging economies: the role of interest rates," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 52(2), pages 345-380, March.
    8. Douglas Gollin, 2002. "Getting Income Shares Right," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 110(2), pages 458-474, April.
    9. Ricardo J. Caballero & Emmanuel Farhi & Pierre-Olivier Gourinchas, 2008. "An Equilibrium Model of "Global Imbalances" and Low Interest Rates," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 98(1), pages 358-393, March.
    10. Pierre-Olivier Gourinchas & Olivier Jeanne, 2013. "Capital Flows to Developing Countries: The Allocation Puzzle," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 80(4), pages 1484-1515.
    11. Maurice Obstfeld & Kenneth Rogoff, 2001. "The Six Major Puzzles in International Macroeconomics: Is There a Common Cause?," NBER Chapters, in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 2000, Volume 15, pages 339-412, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    12. David K. Backus & Patrick J. Kehoe & Finn E. Kydland, 1992. "Dynamics of the trade balance and the terms of trade: the J-curve revisited," Discussion Paper / Institute for Empirical Macroeconomics 65, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis.
    13. Pierre-Olivier Gourinchas & Olivier Jeanne, 2013. "Capital Flows to Developing Countries: The Allocation Puzzle," Review of Economic Studies, Oxford University Press, vol. 80(4), pages 1484-1515.
    14. Eaton, Jonathan & Kortum, Samuel & Neiman, Brent, 2016. "Obstfeld and Rogoff׳s international macro puzzles: a quantitative assessment," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 72(C), pages 5-23.
    15. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/169d87l3e88rpoi5e1tgckfi6a is not listed on IDEAS
    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. Struck, Clemens C., 2018. "Labor market frictions, investment and capital flows," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 163(C), pages 27-31.
    2. Clemens Struck & Adnan Velic, 2016. "Competing Gains From Trade," Trinity Economics Papers tep1116, Trinity College Dublin, Department of Economics, revised Apr 2018.
    3. Lee E. Ohanian & Paulina Restrepo-Echavarria & Mark L. J. Wright, 2018. "Bad Investments and Missed Opportunities? Postwar Capital Flows to Asia and Latin America," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 108(12), pages 3541-3582, December.
    4. Jonathan Heathcote & Fabrizio Perri, 2016. "On the Desirability of Capital Controls," IMF Economic Review, Palgrave Macmillan;International Monetary Fund, vol. 64(1), pages 75-102, May.
    5. Heathcote, Jonathan & Perri, Fabrizio, 2014. "Assessing International Efficiency," Handbook of International Economics, in: Gopinath, G. & Helpman, . & Rogoff, K. (ed.), Handbook of International Economics, edition 1, volume 4, chapter 0, pages 523-584, Elsevier.
    6. Ning Zhang, 2019. "Asset home bias in debtor and creditor countries," 2019 Meeting Papers 850, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    7. Ning Zhang, 2018. "Asset home bias in debtor and creditor countries," Working Papers 2019_11, Business School - Economics, University of Glasgow.
    8. Oleg Itskhoki & Dmitry Mukhin, 2021. "Exchange Rate Disconnect in General Equilibrium," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 129(8), pages 2183-2232.
    9. Ning Zhang, 2018. "Asset home bias in debtor and creditor countries," Working Papers 2019-11, Business School - Economics, University of Glasgow.
    10. Yongsung Chang & Sun-Bin Kim & Jaewoo Lee, 2013. "Accounting for Global Dispersion of Current Accounts," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 16(3), pages 477-496, July.
    11. Chen, Kuan-Jen & Chu, Angus C. & Lai, Ching-Chong, 2018. "Home production and small open economy business cycles," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 95(C), pages 110-135.
    12. Gourinchas, Pierre-Olivier & Rey, Hélène, 2014. "External Adjustment, Global Imbalances, Valuation Effects," Handbook of International Economics, in: Gopinath, G. & Helpman, . & Rogoff, K. (ed.), Handbook of International Economics, edition 1, volume 4, chapter 0, pages 585-645, Elsevier.
    13. Lee E. Ohanian & Paulina Restrepo-Echavarria & Diana Van Patten & Mark L. J. Wright, 2020. "The Impact of Bretton Woods International Capital Controls on the Global Economy and the Value of Geopolitical Stability: A General Equilibrium Analysis," Working Papers 2020-042, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, revised 19 Sep 2024.
    14. Cozzi, Guido & Davenport, Margaret, 2017. "Extrapolative expectations and capital flows during convergence," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 108(C), pages 169-190.
    15. Andrea Raffo, 2006. "Net exports, consumption volatility, and international real business cycle models," Research Working Paper RWP 06-01, Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City.
    16. Michaud, Amanda & Rothert, Jacek, 2018. "Redistributive fiscal policies and business cycles in emerging economies," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 112(C), pages 123-133.
    17. D. Siena, 2014. "The European Monetary Union and Imbalances: Is it an Anticipation Story ?," Working papers 501, Banque de France.
    18. Yun Jung Kim & Jing Zhang, 2023. "International Capital Flows: Private Versus Public Flows In Developing And Developed Countries," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 64(1), pages 225-260, February.
    19. David Kohn & Fernando Leibovici & Håkon Tretvoll, 2021. "Trade in Commodities and Business Cycle Volatility," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 13(3), pages 173-208, July.
    20. Jonathan Heathcote & Fabrizio Perri, 2013. "The International Diversification Puzzle Is Not as Bad as You Think," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 121(6), pages 1108-1159.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Investment prices; Capital flows; Current account; Global imbalances; Capital returns; Labor market frictions; Trade frictions;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • F21 - International Economics - - International Factor Movements and International Business - - - International Investment; Long-Term Capital Movements
    • F32 - International Economics - - International Finance - - - Current Account Adjustment; Short-term Capital Movements

    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:ucn:wpaper:201729. 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: Nicolas Clifton (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/educdie.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.