Three Essays in Macroeconomics with Heterogeneous Agents

Three Essays in Macroeconomics with Heterogeneous Agents PDF Author: Ying Tung Chan
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ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :

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"This thesis extends the macroeconomic theory with heterogeneous agents by taking account of heterogeneous households' interaction among themselves, in the form of comparing their consumptions or incomes, and by allowing heterogeneous firms to interact in a strategic fashion. In Chapter 2, I study how behavioral hypotheses such as the concern for status (relative consumption) and inequality aversion can lead to useful predictions about the evolution of wealth distribution and asset accumulation. Households are heterogeneous in terms of initial endowments and idiosyncratic shocks to their labor productivity. I propose a generalized concept of consumption externalities which include as special cases the concern for relative consumption, and preferences that display inequality aversion. In Chapter 3, I focus on interactions among heterogeneous firms in an oligopolistic framework. I assume that that the products offered by these firms are not perfect substitutes. More important, the degree of substitutability may vary across products within the industry. I offer a general formulation of industry structure such that monopoly, oligopoly, and monopolistic competition can be obtained as special cases. In Chapter 4, we study how preferences that display ambiguity aversion play a role in the job search process and affects the equilibrium rates of unemployment and vacancy. Ambiguity refers to the lack of information about probability distributions. The traditional job search model assumes that there are random matches between job seekers and firms (or vacancies), and the random draws have objective probability distributions that are known to both sides of the markets. We modify this model and assume that economic agents are uncertain about the underlying probability distributions. This chapter contributes to our understanding of how ambiguity aversion affects the unemployment rate and aggregate productivity." --

Three Essays in Macroeconomics with Heterogeneous Agents

Three Essays in Macroeconomics with Heterogeneous Agents PDF Author: Ying Tung Chan
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :

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Book Description
"This thesis extends the macroeconomic theory with heterogeneous agents by taking account of heterogeneous households' interaction among themselves, in the form of comparing their consumptions or incomes, and by allowing heterogeneous firms to interact in a strategic fashion. In Chapter 2, I study how behavioral hypotheses such as the concern for status (relative consumption) and inequality aversion can lead to useful predictions about the evolution of wealth distribution and asset accumulation. Households are heterogeneous in terms of initial endowments and idiosyncratic shocks to their labor productivity. I propose a generalized concept of consumption externalities which include as special cases the concern for relative consumption, and preferences that display inequality aversion. In Chapter 3, I focus on interactions among heterogeneous firms in an oligopolistic framework. I assume that that the products offered by these firms are not perfect substitutes. More important, the degree of substitutability may vary across products within the industry. I offer a general formulation of industry structure such that monopoly, oligopoly, and monopolistic competition can be obtained as special cases. In Chapter 4, we study how preferences that display ambiguity aversion play a role in the job search process and affects the equilibrium rates of unemployment and vacancy. Ambiguity refers to the lack of information about probability distributions. The traditional job search model assumes that there are random matches between job seekers and firms (or vacancies), and the random draws have objective probability distributions that are known to both sides of the markets. We modify this model and assume that economic agents are uncertain about the underlying probability distributions. This chapter contributes to our understanding of how ambiguity aversion affects the unemployment rate and aggregate productivity." --

Three Essays in Macroeconomics

Three Essays in Macroeconomics PDF Author: Chacko George
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ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 276

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This dissertation consists of three essays on topics in macroeconomics. In the first chapter, I construct a macroeconomic model with a heterogeneous banking sector and an interbank lending market. Banks differ in their ability to transform deposits from households into loans to firms. Bank size differences emerge endogenously in the model, and in steady state, the induced bank size distribution matches two stylized facts in the data: bigger banks borrow more on the interbank lending market than smaller banks, and bigger banks are more leveraged than smaller banks. I use the model to evaluate the impact of increasing concentration in US banking on the severity of potential downturns. I find that if the banking sector in 2007 was only as concentrated as it was in 1992, GDP during the Great Recession would have declined by 40% less it did, and would have recovered twice as fast. In the second chapter, my co-author and I investigate the impact of firm capacity constraints on aggregate production and productivity when the economy is driven by aggregate and idiosyncratic demand shocks. We are motivated by three observed regularities in US GDP: business cycles are asymmetric, in that large absolute changes in output are more likely to be negative than positive; capacity and capital utilization are procyclical, and increase the procyclicality of measured productivity; the dispersion of firm productivity increases in recessions. We devise a model of demand shocks and endogenous capacity constraints that is qualitatively consistent with these observations. We then calibrate the model to aggregate utilization data using standard Bayesian techniques. Quantitatively, we find that the calibrated model also exhibits significant asymmetry in output, on the order of the regularities observed in GDP. The third chapter explores the role of distance in equilibrium selection. I consider a model economy with multiple steady state equilibria where a high productivity and a low productivity technology are available for use in production. The high productivity technology requires a fixed set up cost for production. Sectors are linked by localized production complementarities. I consider selection under a learning rule in which agents imitate their most successful neighbor. As distance between neighbors decreases, the possible profits from industrialization increase, and the likelihood that the learning rule process converges to a steady state matching the H equilibrium increases. The result suggests that, in the presence of localized technology spillovers, there may be important gains to economic growth from infrastructure development.

Essays in Macroeconomics with Heterogeneous Agents

Essays in Macroeconomics with Heterogeneous Agents PDF Author: Pierre-Alexandre Noual
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ISBN: 9780549302100
Category : Labor supply
Languages : en
Pages : 87

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My dissertation investigates two models of macroeconomics with heterogeneous agents. The first chapter analyzes a setup where agents are ex ante identical, yet receive idiosyncratic income shocks which make them heterogeneous ex post. A private information friction gives rise to incomplete risk-sharing as a constrained-efficient allocation. The second chapter again considers ex post heterogeneous agents: they have identical preferences but face idiosyncratic shocks to their earning capacity. There the focus is not on risk-sharing, but on the aggregate consequences for labor supply.

Three Essays in Macroeconomics and Finance

Three Essays in Macroeconomics and Finance PDF Author: David Henry Bowman
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ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 230

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Three Essays on Heterogeneity in Macroeconomics

Three Essays on Heterogeneity in Macroeconomics PDF Author: Ryan Douglas Edwards
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 352

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Three Essays in Macroeconomics and Finance

Three Essays in Macroeconomics and Finance PDF Author: Yang Li
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ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Chapter 1 develops a continuous-time, heterogeneous agents version of the Barro-Rietz rare disasters model. Following Gabaix (2012), the disaster probability is assumed to be time-varying. The economy consists of two types of agents: (1) a "rational" agent, who updates his beliefs using Bayes Rule, and (2) a "robust" agent, who updates his beliefs using a pessimistically distorted prior. Following Hansen and Sargent (2008), pessimism is disciplined using detection error probabilities. Disaster risk is assumed to be nontradeable. The model is calibrated to US data, and focuses on three disaster episodes: (1) The Great Depression of 1929-33, (2) The Financial Crisis of 2008-09, and (3) The Covid Pandemic of 2020. The key contribution of the paper is to show that the model can replicate the observed spike in trading volume that occurs during disasters. Trading produces endogenous low frequency dynamics in the distribution of wealth. The relative wealth of robust agents gradually declines during normal times, but rises sharply during disasters. These results sound a note of caution when interpreting short-run movements in the distribution of wealth. Chapter 2 examines the market selection hypothesis in a continuous time asset pricing model with jumps. It is shown that the hypothesis is valid when agents have log preferences. The result is robust as it does not depend on whether markets are incomplete. Jumps affect long-run wealth dynamics through a redistribution channel: Disasters lead to large wealth redistribution as agents with heterogeneous beliefs about disasters have different exposures to risky assets. Using tools from ergodic theory, I prove a novel result that generalizes the rationality concept in the existing literature: an agent endowed with the optimal filter will outperform other agents in complete financial markets asymptotically. Chapter 3, a joint paper with Xiaowen Lei, develops a continuous-time overlapping generations model with rare disasters and agents who learn from their own experiences. Using microdata about household finance in China, we establish that economic disasters such as the Great Leap Forward make investors distrustful of the market. Generations that experience disasters invest a lower fraction of their wealth in risky assets, even if similar disasters are not likely to occur again during their lifetimes. "Fearing to attempt" therefore inhibits wealth accumulation by these "depression babies" relative to other generations.

קבר הגולגלות החוורות

קבר הגולגלות החוורות PDF Author:
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ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :

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Three Essays on Heterogeneity in Macroeconomics

Three Essays on Heterogeneity in Macroeconomics PDF Author: Mohamed Diaby
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ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :

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Three Essays on General Macroeconomics

Three Essays on General Macroeconomics PDF Author: Shuaiyi Liu
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Electronic books
Languages : en
Pages : 164

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The thesis is made up of three chapters that work on three distinct topics in macroeconomics. The first chapter is a theoretical work on monetary policy, in which a coherent and intuitive large-scale Dynamic Stochastic General Equilibrium (DSGE) model matching with particulars of the Chinese economy is established to understand how and why Reserve Requirement Ratio (RRR) works within Chinese monetary policy regime. The second chapter reveals the relationship between phenomenon of inequality and secular stagnation with a three-period Overlapping Generations (OLG) model built within a heterogeneous agent framework. It also points out workable ways of conducting macroprudential policy given the aforesaid two phenomena. The third chapter both theoretically and empirically examines effectiveness of the currency board system in Hong Kong using an advanced macroeconomic modeling toolbox as well as a workhorse model used by a mass of central banks that is further modified to be in line with reality of the Hong Kong economy.

Essays on Macroeconomics with Heterogeneous Agents

Essays on Macroeconomics with Heterogeneous Agents PDF Author: Kyooho Kwon
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ISBN:
Category : Labor supply
Languages : en
Pages : 84

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"Chapter 1 develops a heterogeneous-agent general equilibrium model that incorporates both intensive and extensive margins of labor supply. A nonconvexity in the mapping between time devoted to work and labor services distinguishes between extensive and intensive margins. We consider calibrated versions of this model that differ in the value of a key preference parameter for labor supply and the extent of heterogeneity. The model is able to capture the key features of the empirical hours worked distribution, including how individuals transit within this distribution. We then study how the various specifications influence labor supply responses to temporary shocks and permanent tax changes, with a particular focus on the intensive and extensive margin elasticities in response to these changes. We find important interactions between heterogeneity and the extent of curvature in preferences. Chapter 2 builds a model of family labor supply in which individuals choose between full-time work, part-time work, and nonemployment. The model is calibrated to replicate the movements of both male and female workers among these states. The willingness to substitute hours over time (the so-called intertemporal elasticity of labor supply) is critical for many economic analysis. A common strategy for uncovering the value of this willingness is to carry out structural estimation on micro panel data. One general issue in this estimation exercises using micro data is that misspecification of the constraints that individuals face is likely to influence inference about preference parameters. In the model economy, although the individual labor supply problem is a discrete choice problem, individuals are able to adjust hours along the intensive margin by moving between part-time and fulltime work. Intuitively, adjustment along the intensive margin potentially allows one to estimate the true value of the underlying curvature parameter describing the utility from leisure. We explore the extent to which standard labor supply methods can achieve this in our setting. Although these methods deliver precise estimates that are significantly different from zero, the estimates are effectively unrelated to the true underlying values. These methods also deliver elasticity estimates for women, even when the underlying preference parameters are the same for men and women. Chapter 3 investigates the optimal progressive tax code in an incomplete-market economy in which households are linked intergenerationally by altruism and earning ability. The model economy is calibrated to that of the US with the progressive tax code suggested by Gouviea and Strauss (1994). First, I compute the equilibrium with the optimal progressive tax code. Second, I investigate the extent to which the size of government welfare programs affects the optimal progressivity of the income tax code. I find that the optimal tax code for an economy populated with altruistic households is approximately equivalent to a proportional tax of 23.1% with a fixed deduction of approximately $17,000 in 1990 US dollars. For an economy populated with non-altruistic households, however, these numbers are 18.8% and $12,000 respectively. This result implies that inequality is more severe in an economy with intergenerational links so that the policy maker requires a more progressive tax system to provide insurance. Additionally, I find that when the size of the government welfare program is chosen carefully, the additional insurance benefits from the progressive income tax code disappear"--Pages iv-v.