In a recent paper, Gruber (Gruber, J.W., 2004, A Present Value Test of Habits and the Current Account, Journal of Monetary Economics 51, 1495-1507) claims that habit formation in consumption plays an important role in current account fluctuations in selected developed countries, extending the...

A recent paper claims that habit formation in consumption plays an important role in current account fluctuations in selected developed countries, extending the present-value model of the current account (PVM) with consumption habits. In this paper, however, I show that the habit-forming PVM is...

Tests of the present-value model of the current account are frequently rejected by the data. Standard explanations rely on the "usual suspects" of non-separable preferences, shocks to fiscal policy and the world real interest rate, and imperfect international capital mobility. We confirm these...