This paper develops a real business cycle model characterized by a large number of agents facing idiosyncratic employment shocks and borrowing constraints. In particular, I use numerical methods to study the statistical properties of aggregate variables in equilibrium under both complete and...

In this paper, we develop an analytical framework for the estimation of potential output and output gaps for the euro area combining multivariate filtering techniques with the production function approach. The advantage of this methodology lies in the fact that it combines a model based approach...

There is now considerable evidence that business cycle variation in output and employment in the U.S. differs in expansions and contractions. We present nonparametric evidence that asymmetries are strongest in durable goods manufacturing. In a Markov switching framework, we find two leading...

Monetary policy conducted in real time has to take into account the preliminary nature of recent national accounts data. Not only recent data, but also figures dating many years back are potentially subject to revisions. This means that there is a danger that an important part of the central...

The objective of this paper is to calculate, model, and forecast realized volatility using high-frequency stock-market index data. The approach differs from existing ones in several ways. First, it is shown that the decay of the serial dependence of high-frequency returns on the sampling...

We formulate and estimate a RBC model with structural changes and with bounded rationality, where the economic agents have to learn about the former. This paper investigates whether the agents’ learning process can generate business cycles fluctuations which are empirically plausible....