Working Paper

The GVAR approach and the dominance of the U.S. economy

Abstract: This paper extends the recent literature about global macroeconomic modelling by allowing the presence of a globally dominant economy. Our contribution is both theoretical and empirical. From a theoretical standpoint, we follow Chudik and Pesaran (2011 and 2012) to derive the GVAR approach as an approximation to two Infinite-Dimensional VAR (IVAR) models featuring nonstationary variables: one corresponding to the world consisting of several small open economies (benchmark model), and one corresponding to the world featuring a dominant economy (extended model). ; It is established that in the presence of a dominant economy, restrictions implied by the asymptotic analysis of a system without a dominant economy are no longer valid. The theoretical framework is then brought to the data by estimating both versions of the GVAR model featuring 33 countries for the period 1979(Q2)?2003(Q4). We found some support for the extended version of the GVAR model, allowing the US to be the dominant player in the world economy.

Keywords: Forecasting;

Bibliographic Information

Provider: Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

Part of Series: Globalization Institute Working Papers

Publication Date: 2013

Number: 136