This paper takes an otherwise standard real-business-cycle setup with government sector, and augments it with shocks to consumer confidence to study business cycle fluctuations. A surprise increase in consumer confidence generates higher utility, as the household values consumption more in...

Using a wide variety of business cycle dating and filtering techniques, this paper documents the cyclical behavior of the post-tax income distribution in the US. First, all incomes are cyclical and co-move with the business cycle. Second, lower and higher income individuals experience...

We document the cyclical behavior of the post-tax income distribution in the US. The analysis is based on a dataset that is informative for the lower and the upper tail of the post-tax income distribution and that also matches aggregate national income. Most importantly, lower and higher income...