IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/zbw/sfb649/sfb649dp2010-057.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Consumption growth and volatility with consumption externalities

Author

Listed:
  • Xie, Runli

Abstract

This paper studies the link between group-specific consumption growth and volatility within a framework of heterogeneous agents, under the assumption of a consumption externality. Household preferences are related to the volatility through asset holding decisions: volatility decreases with groups' degree of patience, and increases with household eagerness to keep up with the group average. Moreover, consumption growth is expected to relate positively to the volatility. This last hypothesis is tested using household data imputed from GSOEP and the German Income and Expenditure Survey (EVS), where a U-shaped relationship is found for the nondurable consumption. Moreover, examining the growth-inequality relationship using EVS data alone shows that it is positive for nondurable and negative for durable consumption.

Suggested Citation

  • Xie, Runli, 2010. "Consumption growth and volatility with consumption externalities," SFB 649 Discussion Papers 2010-057, Humboldt University Berlin, Collaborative Research Center 649: Economic Risk.
    • Handle: RePEc:zbw:sfb649:sfb649dp2010-057
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/56678/1/641647514.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Abel, Andrew B, 1990. "Asset Prices under Habit Formation and Catching Up with the Joneses," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 80(2), pages 38-42, May.
    2. Dirk Kreuger & Fabrizio Perri, 2002. "Does Income Inequality Lead to Consumption Inequality? Evidence and Theory," Working Papers 02-15, New York University, Leonard N. Stern School of Business, Department of Economics.
    3. Anna Fräßdorf & Markus M. Grabka & Johannes Schwarze, 2008. "The impact of household capital income on income inequality: A factor decomposition analysis for Great Britain, Germany and the USA," Working Papers 89, ECINEQ, Society for the Study of Economic Inequality.
    4. Fafchamps, Marcel & Shilpi, Forhad, 2008. "Subjective welfare, isolation, and relative consumption," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 86(1), pages 43-60, April.
    5. Alpizar, Francisco & Carlsson, Fredrik & Johansson-Stenman, Olof, 2005. "How much do we care about absolute versus relative income and consumption?," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 56(3), pages 405-421, March.
    6. Gundi Knies, 2010. "Income Comparisons among Neighbours and Life Satisfaction in East and West Germany," SOEPpapers on Multidisciplinary Panel Data Research 298, DIW Berlin, The German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP).
    7. Jang-Ting Guo, 2004. "Tax Policy Under Keeping Up with the Joneses and Imperfectly Competitive Product Markets," Econometric Society 2004 North American Winter Meetings 17, Econometric Society.
    8. Nicola Fuchs-Schuendeln & Dirk Krueger & Mathias Sommer, 2010. "Inequality Trends for Germany in the Last Two Decades: A Tale of Two Countries," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 13(1), pages 103-132, January.
    9. Harald Uhlig & Lars Ljungqvist, 2000. "Tax Policy and Aggregate Demand Management under Catching Up with the Joneses," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 90(3), pages 356-366, June.
    10. Deaton, Angus, 1992. "Understanding Consumption," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780198288244, Decembrie.
    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. Basteck, Christian & Daniëls, Tijmen R., 2010. "Every symmetric 3 x 3 global game of strategic complementarities is noise independent," SFB 649 Discussion Papers 2010-061, Humboldt University Berlin, Collaborative Research Center 649: Economic Risk.
    2. repec:hum:wpaper:sfb649dp2010-061 is not listed on IDEAS
    3. repec:hum:wpaper:sfb649dp2010-059 is not listed on IDEAS
    4. Mammen, Enno & Rothe, Christoph & Schienle, Melanie, 2010. "Nonparametric regression with nonparametrically generated covariates," SFB 649 Discussion Papers 2010-059, Humboldt University Berlin, Collaborative Research Center 649: Economic Risk.

    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. repec:hum:wpaper:sfb649dp2009-035 is not listed on IDEAS
    2. Xie, Runli, 2009. "Trade-off between consumption growth and inequality: Theory and evidence for Germany," SFB 649 Discussion Papers 2009-035, Humboldt University Berlin, Collaborative Research Center 649: Economic Risk.
    3. Alpaslan Akay & Lisa Andersson & Peter Martinsson & Haileselassie Medhin, 2014. "Positional Concerns among the Poor: Does Reference Group Matter? Evidence from Survey Experiments," Journal of African Economies, Centre for the Study of African Economies, vol. 23(5), pages 673-699.
    4. repec:hum:wpaper:sfb649dp2010-057 is not listed on IDEAS
    5. Francisco Alvarez-Cuadrado & Jose Maria Casado & Jose Maria Labeaga, 2016. "Envy and Habits: Panel Data Estimates of Interdependent Preferences," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 78(4), pages 443-469, August.
    6. Francisco Alvarez-Cuadrado & Ngo Van Long, 2012. "Envy and Inequality," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 114(3), pages 949-973, September.
    7. Thomas Aronsson & Olof Johansson-Stenman, 2014. "When Samuelson Met Veblen Abroad: National and Global Public Good Provision when Social Comparisons Matter," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 81(322), pages 224-243, April.
    8. Aronsson, Thomas & Johansson-Stenman, Olof, 2014. "Positional preferences in time and space: Optimal income taxation with dynamic social comparisons," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 101(C), pages 1-23.
    9. Moritz Drechsel-Grau & Kai Daniel Schmid, 2013. "Consumption-Savings Decisions under Upward Looking Comparisons: Evidence from Germany, 2002-2011," IMK Working Paper 118-2013, IMK at the Hans Boeckler Foundation, Macroeconomic Policy Institute.
    10. Kazuo Mino & Yasuhiro Nakamoto, 2016. "Heterogeneous conformism and wealth distribution in a neoclassical growth model," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 62(4), pages 689-717, October.
    11. König, Tobias & Lausen, Tobias, 2016. "Relative consumption preferences and public provision of private goods," Discussion Papers, Research Unit: Market Behavior SP II 2016-213, WZB Berlin Social Science Center.
    12. Leites, Martín & Rivero, Analía & Salas, Gonzalo, 2024. "The positionality of goods and the positional concern’s origin," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 109(C).
    13. Jim Malley & Hassan Molana, 2002. "The Life-Cycle-Permanent-Income Model: A Reinterpretation and Supporting Evidence," Working Papers 2002_17, Business School - Economics, University of Glasgow.
    14. Andrew E. Clark & Paul Frijters & Michael A. Shields, 2006. "Income and happiness: Evidence, explanations and economic implications," PSE Working Papers halshs-00590436, HAL.
    15. Chan, Ying Tung, 2020. "Optimal emissions tax rates under habit formation and social comparisons," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 146(C).
    16. Drechsel-Grau, Moritz & Schmid, Kai D., 2014. "Consumption–savings decisions under upward-looking comparisons," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 106(C), pages 254-268.
    17. Sámano Daniel, 2009. "Explaining Taxes at the Upper Tail of the Income Distribution: The Role of Utility Interdependence," Working Papers 2009-16, Banco de México.
    18. Francisco Alvarez-Cuadrado & Ngo Van Long, 2008. "A Permanent Income Version of the Relative Income Hypothesis," CESifo Working Paper Series 2361, CESifo.
    19. Akay, Alpaslan & Martinsson, Peter, 2012. "Positional Concerns through the Life Cycle: Evidence from Subjective Well-Being Data and Survey Experiments," IZA Discussion Papers 6342, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    20. Aronsson, Thomas & Johansson-Stenman, Olof, 2008. "Positional Concerns with Multiple Reference Points: Optimal Income Taxation and Public Goods in an OLG Model," Umeå Economic Studies 740, Umeå University, Department of Economics.
    21. Shu-Hua Chen, 2012. "On the Growth and Stability Effects of Habit Formation and Durability in Consumption," Annals of Economics and Finance, Society for AEF, vol. 13(2), pages 283-298, November.
    22. Clark, Andrew E. & D'Ambrosio, Conchita, 2014. "Attitudes to Income Inequality: Experimental and Survey Evidence," IZA Discussion Papers 8136, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    consumption growth; consumption volatility; within-group inequality; GSOEP; EVS;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • E21 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Consumption; Saving; Wealth
    • D91 - Microeconomics - - Micro-Based Behavioral Economics - - - Role and Effects of Psychological, Emotional, Social, and Cognitive Factors on Decision Making
    • D31 - Microeconomics - - Distribution - - - Personal Income and Wealth Distribution
    • D64 - Microeconomics - - Welfare Economics - - - Altruism; Philanthropy; Intergenerational Transfers

    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:zbw:sfb649:sfb649dp2010-057. 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: ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/sohubde.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.