Previous studies on financial frictions have been unable to establish the empirical significance of credit constraints in macroeconomic fluctuations. This paper argues that the muted impact of credit constraints stems from the absence of a mechanism to explain the observed persistent comovements...

We use a quantitative equilibrium model with houses, collateralized debt and foreign borrowing to study the impact of global imbalances on the U.S. economy in the 2000s. Our results suggest that the dynamics of foreign capital flows account for between one fourth and one third of the increase in...

Longstanding speculation about the likelihood of a housing market collapse has given way in the past few months to consideration of just how far the housing market will fall, and how much damage the debacle will inflict on the economy. This paper assesses the magnitude of the impact of housing...

Expectations about future housing prices are arguably an important determinant of actual housing prices, and an important input in decisions on whether and how to transact in the housing market. Using novel micro-level survey data on Swedish households, we analyse households' expectations of...

Self-reported home values are widely used as a measure of housing wealth by researchers; the accuracy of this measure, however, is an open empirical question, and requires some type of market assessment of the values reported. In this study, the authors examine the predictive power of...

It is often argued that capital should flow from aging industrialized economies to countries with fast-growing populations. However, institutional failures and the risk of expropriation substantially reduce developing economies' attractiveness for foreign investors. We analyze the influence of a...

Ageing gives rise to concern about the sustainability of pay-as-you-go pension systems. One reform option suggested is to make the system actuarial by a tight connection between contributions and benefits. The incentives for the individual will then coincide with the interest of the pension...

This paper empirically examines the effect of population growth on real interest rates. Although this effect is well founded in macroeconomic theory, the corresponding empirical results have been rather tenuous. Demographic interest rate theories are typically based on long-term relationships...