Using Bayesian tests for a structural break at an unknown break date, we search for a volatility reduction within the post-war sample for the growth rates of U.S. aggregate and disaggregate real GDP. We find that the growth rate of aggregate real GDP has been less volatile since the early...

Recessions and subsequent recoveries are frequently classified as “L-shaped” or “U-shaped,” with output losses in the former being permanent and losses in the latter at least partially made up by higher than average growth during the recovery. We estimate the probability of a U-shaped...

I use a Bayesian Markov-switching model to forecast world GDP per capita over the next 100 years. The switching model estimates the probability that a country is currently on a path to converge to the world frontier for each country in the world, as well as the probability that a country that is...

GDP growth typically vibrates with modest variation around a mean of a few percent per year, but periodically, mean growth undergoes a major shift, vibrating thereafter around a new level. I present a transmission mechanism with nonlinear dynamics that endogenously translates random sectoral...