This paper compares the role of stochastic volatility versus changes in monetary policy rules in accounting for the time-varying volatility of U.S. aggregate data. Of special interest to us is understanding the sources of the great moderation of business cycle fluctuations that the U.S. economy...

We solve a dynamic stochastic general equilibrium (DSGE) model in which the representative household has Epstein and Zin recursive preferences. The parameters governing preferences and technology are estimated by means of maximum likelihood using macroeconomic data and asset prices, with a...

In this paper we report the results of the estimation of a rich dynamic stochastic general equilibrium (DSGE) model of the U.S. economy with both stochastic volatility and parameter drifting in the Taylor rule. We use the results of this estimation to examine the recent monetary history of the...

This paper shows how to build algorithms that use graphics processing units (GPUs) installed in most modern computers to solve dynamic equilibrium models in economics. In particular, we rely on the compute uni.ed device architecture (CUDA) of NVIDIA GPUs. We illustrate the power of the approach...

This paper shows how changes in the volatility of the real interest rate at which small open emerging economies borrow have a quantitatively important effect on real variables like output, consumption, investment, and hours worked. To motivate our investigation, we document the strong evidence...

We propose a novel method to estimate dynamic equilibrium models with stochastic volatility. First, we characterize the properties of the solution to this class of models. Second, we take advantage of the results about the structure of the solution to build a sequential Monte Carlo algorithm to...

We propose and solve a small-scale New-Keynesian model with Markov sunspot shocks that move the economy between a targeted-inflation regime and a deflation regime and fit it to data from the U.S. and Japan. For the U.S. we find that adverse demand shocks have moved the economy to the zero lower...

We provide a novel methodology for estimating time-varying weights in linear prediction pools, which we call Dynamic Pools, and use it to investigate the relative forecasting performance of DSGE models with and without financial frictions for output growth and inflation from 1992 to 2011. We...

We propose and illustrate a Markov-switching multi-fractal duration (MSMD) model for analysis of inter-trade durations in financial markets. We establish several of its key properties with emphasis on high persistence (indeed long memory). Empirical exploration suggests MSMD's superiority...

Two often-divergent U.S. GDP estimates are available, a widely-used expenditure side version, GDPE, and a much less widely-used income-side version, GDPI . We propose and explore a "forecast combination" approach to combining them. We then put the theory to work, producing a superior combined...