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Discussion Paper
The Slowdown in Global Trade
The slowdown in trade has received a great deal of attention, and it is sometimes cited as one of the reasons for the sluggishness of global output growth. However, the linkage between the two is not clear-cut.
Journal Article
An intersectoral analysis of the secular productivity slowdown
Working Paper
The role of China in Asia: engine, conduit, or steamroller?
This paper assesses China's role in Asia as an independent engine of growth, as a conduit of demand from the industrial countries, and as a competitor for export markets. We provide both macroeconomic and microeconomic evidence. The macroeconomic analysis focuses on the impact of U.S. and Chinese demand on the output of the Asian economies by estimating growth comovements and VARs. The results suggest an increasing role of China as an independent source of growth. The microeconomic analysis decomposes trade into basic products, parts and components, and finished goods. We find a large role ...
Working Paper
Empirical estimation of trend and cyclical export elasticities
This paper uses an adaptation of Vahid and Engle's common trend/common cycle analysis to estimate trend and cyclical export elasticities for trading partner income and real exchange rates for 36 countries. For the countries for which both types of income elasticities can be identified, the cyclical elasticity is on average more than twice as large as the trend elasticity. The methodology is applied to forecasting exports during the recent cycle and it appears to improve on simpler models for about half of the countries. For an aggregate of all of the countries for which separate elasticities ...
Discussion Paper
Induced innovation and productivity growth: an empirical analysis
Working Paper
Do recessions affect potential output?
A number of previous studies have looked at the effect of financial crises on actual output several years beyond the crisis. The purpose of this paper is to examine whether the growth of potential output also is affected by recessions, whether or not they include financial crises. Trend per capita output growth is calculated using HP filters, and average growth is compared for the two years preceding a recession, the two years immediately following a recession peak, and the two years after that. Panel regressions are run to determine whether characteristics of recessions, including depth, ...
Working Paper
Inflation-adjusted potential output
This paper estimates potential output for seven countries using a multivariate version of the Hodrick-Prescott filter in which observations on inflation are used to help separate trend from cyclical movements in output. The potential series are estimated first on an aggregate basis, and then by disaggregating output into three major components: labor productivity, the employment-population ratio, and population. Potential levels of productivity and the employment-population ratios are calculated using the multivariate filter and combined with actual population to derive an alternative, ...
Working Paper
Preventing deflation: lessons from Japan's experience in the 1990s
This paper examines Japan's experience in the first half of the 1990s to shed some light on several issues that arise as inflation declines toward zero. Is it possible to recognize when an economy is moving into a phase of sustained deflation? How quickly should monetary policy respond to sharp declines in inflation? Are there factors that inhibit the monetary transmission mechanism as interest rates approach zero? What is the role for fiscal policy in warding off a deflationary episode? We conclude that Japan's sustained deflationary slump was very much unanticipated by Japanese policymakers ...
Working Paper
Cyclically Adjusted Current Account Balances
The Great Financial Crisis coincided with a sizable reduction in global external imbalances, defined as the absolute value of the sum of individual country current account surpluses and deficits relative to global GDP. Although current account balances should not respond to a downturn that is uniform across countries, one that hits countries with current account deficits harder than those with surpluses might result in a decline in the global balance. This paper quantifies the cyclical portion of the current account balance for 35 countries using estimates of the severity of the cycle in each ...