It has been shown that under perfect competition and a Cobb-Douglas production function, a basic real business cycle model may exhibit indeterminacy and sunspot fluctuations when income tax rates are determined by a balanced-budget rule. This paper introduces in an otherwise standard real...

This paper develops and estimates a general equilibrium rational expectations model with search and multiple equilibria where aggregate shocks have a permanent effect on the unemployment rate. If agents' wealth decreases, the unemployment rate increases for a potentially indefinite period. This...

The paper examines the determinants of employment growth, drawing on data available across a sample of Caribbean countries. To that end, the paper analyzes estimates of the employment-output elasticity and the response of employment growth to major sources of labor market determinants, in the...

This Selected Issues paper for Chile describes the postcrisis recovery experience. The recovery from the 2008–2009 global crisis has been markedly different both among advanced and emerging economies. The steady improvement in the labor wedge-distortions related to the consumption leisure...

This paper examines the relationship of business cycles, the terms of trade and Tobin's q using a three-sector dynamic stochastic general equilibrium model for a small open economy. Results show that terms of trade shocks account for half of actual volatility of GDP and stock market indices for...

The paper focuses on short run macroeconomic dynamics triggered by demand side shocks. In particular, the paper analyzes, in a general equilibrium framework, the impact of transitory demand side shocks on the behavior of macroeconomic variables and examines the relevance of policy instruments...

We compare the performance of a currency board, inflation targeting, and dollarization in a small, open developing economy with a liberalized capital account. We focus on the transmission of shocks to currency and country risk premia and on the role of fluctuations in premia in the propagation...

Using firm level data, Bernard and Jensen (1995, 1999, 2001) find that exporters are bigger and more productive than non-exporters. These studies also find that the identity of exporting firms changes over time and that fixed entry and participation costs influence firm's decision to enter and...

This paper presents a simple stochastic growth model in which productivity improvements are the result of both internal (deliberate) and external (serendipitous) learning behaviour. The model is used to illustrate how these different mechanisms of endogenous technological change can lead to...

This paper discusses recent research at the Centre for Growth and Business Cycle Research on the prediction of the expansion and recession phases of the business cycle for the UK, US, Germany, France and Italy. Financial variables are important predictors in these models, with the stock market...