We study a dynamic general equilibrium model in which firms choose their investment level and their capital structure, trading off the tax advantages of debt against the risk of costly default. The costs of bankruptcy are endogenously determined, as bankrupt firms are forced to liquidate their...

The aim of the paper is to present a review of the fiscal imbalances and debt crisis in Greece and identify the possible links with the recent developments in the Greek property market. We follow a non-technical approach to discuss a number of factors that have contributed to the fiscal crisis...

We develop a simple dynamic model of decision making in the presence of moral constraints. Norm violations induce a temporal feeling of guilt that depreciates with time. Due to endogenous fluctuations of guilt, people exhibit a dynamic inconsistency in social preferences—a behavior we term...

We propose uncertainty shocks as a new shock that drives business cycles. First, we demonstrate that microeconomic uncertainty is robustly countercyclical, rising sharply during recessions, particularly during the Great Recession of 2007-2009. Second, we quantify the impact of time-varying...

There is much evidence that price-adjustment frequencies vary widely across industries. This paper shows that inflation persistence is lower with heterogeneity in price stickiness than without it, taking as given the degree of persistence in variables affecting inflation. Differences in the...

Econometrica publishes original articles in all branches of economics - theoretical and empirical, abstract and applied, providing wide-ranging coverage across the subject area. It promotes studies that aim at the unification of the theoretical-quantitative and the empirical-quantitative...

The paper discusses some fundamental problems in monetary economics associated with the determination and role of the numéraire. The issues are introduced by formalising a proposal, attributed to Eisler, to remove the zero lower bound on nominal interest rates by unbundling the numéraire and...

I study the cyclical behavior of an equilibrium search model with endogenous job creation and destruction, with focus the model’s failure to match the observed cyclical volatility of unemployment.. Job creation in the model is influenced by wages in new matches. I summarize microeconometric...

We study whether fiscal restrictions affect volatilities and correlations of macrovariables and the probability of excessive debt for a sample of 48 US states. Fiscal constraints are characterized with a number of indicators and volatility and correlations are computed in several ways. The...

A striking fact about prices is the prevalence of ``sales'': large temporary price cuts followed by a return exactly to the former price. This paper builds a macroeconomic model with a rationale for sales based on firms facing consumers with different price sensitivities. Even if firms can vary...