We document how firm-specific volatility in sales, earnings and employment growth evolved year by year in Japan. Our volatility measure also indicates the evolution of firm turnover. We find that patterns in firm-specific volatility have changed when macroeconomic circumstances have. Firm...

Household spending is typically the largest component of economy activity. This article sets ot some ways of thinking about what shapes household consumption decisions and looks at New Zealand’s experience over the last decade or so – a period marked by rapid growth in asset prices and debt,...

This paper studies the importance of intertemporal substitution in consumption for the cyclical co-movement of consumption, net worth and income in New Zealand. We can largely explain the empirical hump-shaped consumption response to a transitory wealth increase by allowing for time-varying...

We estimate changes in the volatility of firm-level sales, earnings and employment growth of US firms. Our method differs from existing measures for firm-level sales and employment volatility in that it not only captures longer-run changes in volatility, but also measures cyclical changes in...

We document how firm-specific volatility in sales, earnings and employment growth evolved year by year in Japan. Our volatility measure also indicates the evolution of firm turnover. We find that patterns in firm-specific volatility have changed when macroeconomic circumstances have. Firm...

We estimate changes in the volatility of firm-level sales, earnings and employment growth of US firms. Our method differs from existing measures for firm-level sales and employment volatility in that it not only captures longer-run changes in volatility, but also measures cyclical changes in...

Professor Robert J. Gordon, the well-known macroeconomist, visited New Zealand recently to speak at the international conference “Markets and Models: Policy Frontiers in the AWH Phillips Tradition” held from 9 to 11 July 2008. Professor Gordon is Stanley G. Harris Professor in the Social...

This paper develops a new technique for estimating earnings and employment volatility at the firm level, and applies it to Japanese firms. Unlike earlier studies for the United States, we estimate instantaneous volatility for every year, rather than a rolling ten-year average of volatility. In...

It is standard to model the output-inflation trade-off as a linear relationship with a time-invariant slope. We assess empirical evidence for two sets of theories that allow for endogenous variation in the slope of the short-run Phillips curve. At an empirical level, we examine why large...