Working Paper

The less volatile U.S. economy: a Bayesian investigation of timing, breadth, and potential explanations

Abstract: Using a Bayesian model comparison strategy, 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 1980s, and that this volatility reduction is concentrated in the cyclical component of real GDP. The growth rates of many of the broad production sectors of real GDP display similar reductions in volatility, suggesting the aggregate volatility reduction does not have a narrow source. We also find a large volatility reduction in measures of final sales in the goods sector. We contrast this evidence to an existing literature documenting an aggregate volatility reduction that is shared by only one narrow sub-component, the production of durable goods, and is not present in final sales. We also document structural breaks in the persistence and conditional volatility of inflation that occurred over a similar time frame as the volatility reduction in real GDP.

Keywords: Econometric models; Business cycles;

Status: Published in Journal of Business and Economic Statistics, January 2004, 22(1), pp. 80-93

Bibliographic Information

Provider: Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis

Part of Series: Working Papers

Publication Date: 2003

Number: 2001-016