This paper attempts to explain one version of an empirical puzzle noted by Mankiw (2003): a Baumol-Tobin inventory-theoretic money demand equation predicts that the average adult American should have held approximately $551.05 in currency and coin in 1995, while data show an average of $100. The...

The availability of quantity information along with expenditure information in some household surveys allows the estimation of price reactions on the basis of unit values. We compare two specifications that have been proposed in this context by Deaton (1990) and Crawford et al. (1997) in order...

The observed hump-shaped life-cycle pattern in individuals' consumption cannot be explained by the classical consumption-savings model. We explicitly solve a model with utility of both consumption and leisure and with educational decisions affecting future wages. We show optimal consumption is...

Policy analysis frequently requires estimates of aggregate (or mean) consumer elasticities. However, estimates are often made incorrectly, based on elasticity calculations at mean income. We provide in this paper an overall integrated analytical framework that encompasses these biases and...

We present identification and estimation results for the "collective" model of labour supply in which there are discrete choices, censoring of hours and nonparticipation in employment. We derive the collective restrictions on labour supply functions and contrast them with restrictions implied by...

The paper investigates the role of the Intertemporal Elasticity of Substitution (IES ) in determining the equity premium. This is done in an overlapping generations economy populated by agents that live for 2 periods and maximize a Kihlstrom-Mirman expected utility function. The equity premium...

According to the German SAVE survey, more than 40 percent of households regularly save fixed amounts rather than flexibly adjusting savings to income variations as assumed by the Permanent Income Hypothesis (PIH). Fixed amount saving behaviour could thus imply a challenge to PIH-based standard...

Recently Cherchye et al. (2007a) provided a nonparametric characterization of a general collective model for household consumption which includes externalities and public consumption. This characterization involved different testable necessary and sufficient conditions. We discuss the special...

This paper attempts to explain one version of an empirical puzzle noted by Mankiw (2003): a Baumol-Tobin inventory-theoretic money demand equation predicts that the average U.S. adult should have held approximately $551.05 in currency and coin in 1995, while data show an average of $100. The...

The observed hump-shaped life-cycle pattern in individuals' consumption cannot be explained by the classical consumption-savings model. The consensus explanation is that the hump is caused by constraints and unspanned risks. However, we explicitly show that the consumption hump naturally emerges...