IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/wpa/wuwpma/0408010.html

A closer look at the gap. A comment on Cooper and Willis' 'mind the gap' paper

Author

Listed:
  • Christian Bayer

    (Universität Dortmund)

Abstract

Recently, there has been a lively debate between Cooper and Willis (2001,2002,2003a, 2003b) and Caballero and Engel (2004) about the apropriateness of the so-called 'gap approach' to labor adjustment. Cooper and Willis claim that the gap approach is unable to identify non- convex adjustment costs because of a measurement error under the alternative hypothesis of convex costs. This comment assesses the validity of Cooper and Willis' claim by providing evidence from a number of Monte-Carlo experiments. In contrast to Cooper and Willis findings from single simulations, the experiments reveal no tendency to falsely reject the convex-cost hypothesis if one uses the correct one-sided test for non-convexities. In fact, the parameter estimates are typically biased against the hypothesis of non-convex costs. Consequently, there is no tendency to falsely reject although the estimates show substantial excess dispersion as a result of a spurious regression problem.

Suggested Citation

  • Christian Bayer, 2004. "A closer look at the gap. A comment on Cooper and Willis' 'mind the gap' paper," Macroeconomics 0408010, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    • Handle: RePEc:wpa:wuwpma:0408010
    Note: Type of Document - pdf; pages: 9
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://econwpa.ub.uni-muenchen.de/econ-wp/mac/papers/0408/0408010.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Caballero, Ricardo J., 1999. "Aggregate investment," Handbook of Macroeconomics, in: J. B. Taylor & M. Woodford (ed.), Handbook of Macroeconomics, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 12, pages 813-862, Elsevier.
    2. Russell W. Cooper & Jonathan L. Willis, 2001. "The economics of labor adjustment : mind the gap," Research Working Paper RWP 01-06, Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City.
    3. Russell Cooper & Jonathan Willis, 2009. "The Cost of Labor Adjustment: Inferences from the Gap," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 12(4), pages 632-647, October.
    4. Ricardo J. Caballero & Eduardo M. R. A. Engel, 1999. "Explaining Investment Dynamics in U.S. Manufacturing: A Generalized (S,s) Approach," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 67(4), pages 783-826, July.
    5. Ricardo J. Caballero & Eduardo M. R. A. Engel & John C. Haltiwanger, 1995. "Plant-Level Adjustment and Aggregate Investment Dynamics," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 26(2), pages 1-54.
    6. Caballero, Ricardo J. & Engel, Eduardo M.R.A., 2004. "Three Strikes and You're Out: Reply to Cooper and Willis," Center Discussion Papers 28498, Yale University, Economic Growth Center.
    7. Ricardo J. Caballero & Eduardo M. R. A. Engel, 1993. "Microeconomic Adjustment Hazards and Aggregate Dynamics," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 108(2), pages 359-383.
    8. Caballero, Ricardo J & Engel, Eduardo M R A & Haltiwanger, John, 1997. "Aggregate Employment Dynamics: Building from Microeconomic Evidence," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 87(1), pages 115-137, March.
    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. Bayer, Christian, 2006. "Investment dynamics with fixed capital adjustment cost and capital market imperfections," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 53(8), pages 1909-1947, November.
    2. Christian Bayer, 2001. "Aggregate investment dynamics when firms face fixed investment cost and capital market imperfections," Discussion Papers in Economics 01_13, University of Dortmund, Department of Economics.

    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. Marcela Eslava & John Haltiwanger & Adriana Kugler & Maurice Kugler, 2010. "Factor Adjustments after Deregulation: Panel Evidence from Colombian Plants," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 92(2), pages 378-391, May.
    2. Christian Bayer, 2009. "A Comment on the Economics of Labor Adjustment: Mind the Gap: Evidence from a Monte Carlo Experiment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(5), pages 2258-2266, December.
    3. Bayer, Christian, 2008. "On the interaction of financial frictions and fixed capital adjustment costs: Evidence from a panel of German firms," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 32(11), pages 3538-3559, November.
    4. Christian Bayer, 2001. "Aggregate investment dynamics when firms face fixed investment cost and capital market imperfections," Discussion Papers in Economics 01_13, University of Dortmund, Department of Economics.
    5. Daniel Wilson, 2008. "Investment Behavior Of U.S. Firms Over Heterogeneous Capital Goods: A Snapshot," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 54(2), pages 269-278, June.
    6. Ulf Kalckreuth, 2011. "Panel estimation of state-dependent adjustment when the target is unobserved," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 40(1), pages 205-235, February.
    7. R?diger Bachmann & Ricardo J. Caballero & Eduardo M. R. A. Engel, 2013. "Aggregate Implications of Lumpy Investment: New Evidence and a DSGE Model," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 5(4), pages 29-67, October.
    8. Nicholas Bloom, 2009. "The Impact of Uncertainty Shocks," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 77(3), pages 623-685, May.
    9. Ruediger Bachmann & Eduardo Engel & Ricardo Caballero, 2006. "Lumpy Investment in Dynamic General Equilibrium," 2006 Meeting Papers 775, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    10. 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.
    11. Carlos Casacuberta & Néstor Gandelman, 2012. "Protection, Openness, and Factor Adjustment: Evidence from the Manufacturing Sector in Uruguay," Economic Development and Cultural Change, University of Chicago Press, vol. 60(3), pages 597-629.
    12. Ricardo J. Caballero, 1998. "Nonlinear Aggregate Investment Dynamics: Theory and Evidence," Working papers 98-1, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Department of Economics.
    13. Amil Petrin & Jagadeesh Sivadasan, 2006. "Job Security Does Affect Economic Efficiency: Theory, A New Statistic, and Evidence from Chile," NBER Working Papers 12757, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    14. Ricardo J. Caballero & Eduardo M.R.A. Engel, 2004. "A Comment on the Economics of Labor Adjustment: Mind the Gap: Reply," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 94(4), pages 1238-1244, September.
    15. Austan Goolsbee & David B. Gross, 1997. "Estimating Adjustment Costs with Data on Heterogeneous Capital Goods," NBER Working Papers 6342, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    16. Russell W. Cooper & John C. Haltiwanger, 2006. "On the Nature of Capital Adjustment Costs," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 73(3), pages 611-633.
    17. Distante, Roberta & Petrella, Ivan & Santoro, Emiliano, 2013. "Asymmetry Reversals and the Business Cycle," Economy and Society 151531, Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei (FEEM).
    18. Sánchez Mangas, Rocío, 2001. "Estimation of a dynamic discrete choice model of irreversible investment," DES - Working Papers. Statistics and Econometrics. WS ws015628, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid. Departamento de Estadística.
    19. Vivek Ghosal & Yang Ye, 2015. "Uncertainty and the employment dynamics of small and large businesses," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 44(3), pages 529-558, March.
    20. 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.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;

    JEL classification:

    • E2 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment
    • J2 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor

    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:wpa:wuwpma:0408010. 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: EconWPA The email address of this maintainer does not seem to be valid anymore. Please ask EconWPA to update the entry or send us the correct address (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://econwpa.ub.uni-muenchen.de .

    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.