Search Results
Showing results 1 to 10 of approximately 30.
(refine search)
Working Paper
Monetary policy and regional house-price appreciation
This paper examines the link between monetary policy and house-price appreciation by exploiting the fact that monetary policy is set at the national level, but has different effects on state-level activity in the United States. This differential impact of monetary policy provides an exogenous source of variation that can be used to assess the effect of monetary policy on state-level housing prices. Policy accommodation equivalent to 100 basis points on an equilibrium real federal funds rate basis raises housing prices by about 2.5 percent over the next two years. However, the estimated effect ...
Working Paper
Household formation over time: evidence from two cohorts of young adults
This paper analyzes household formation in the United States using data from two cohorts of the national Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY)?the 1979 cohort and the 1997 cohort. The analysis focuses on how various demographic and economic factors impact household formation both within cohorts and over time across cohorts. The results show that there are substantial differences over time in the share of young adults living with their parents. Differences in housing costs and business-cycle conditions can explain up to 70 percent of the difference in household-formation rates across cohorts. ...
Working Paper
Measuring household wealth in the Panel Study of Income Dynamics: the role of retirement assets
While the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID) has much to offer researchers studying household behavior, one limitation is that its summary measure of wealth is not as broad as those of other commonly used surveys, such as the Survey of Consumer Finances (SCF), because it does not include the value of defined-contribution (DC) pensions. This paper describes the pension data available in the PSID and shows how they can be used to create a more comprehensive picture of household finances. We then compare various measures derived from these data with their counterparts from the SCF. Along a ...
Discussion Paper
Changes in U.S. household balance sheet behavior after the housing bust and Great Recession: evidence from panel data
This paper uses panel data through 2011 to examine evidence of shifts in household balance sheet behavior following the financial crisis and Great Recession. The paper considers evidence of balance sheet repair through debt repayment as well as changes in the composition of households? balance sheets and/or saving decisions to determine whether households? desire for holding or investing in riskier versus safer assets has changed. The data show relatively small and limited balance sheet adjustment?especially for those households considered the most likely to have been impacted by the economic ...
Report
Household formation over time: evidence from two cohorts of young adults
Residential investment accounts for an important component of U.S. gross domestic product, and traditionally plays a strong role in business cycle expansions. U.S. residential investment has improved slowly during the recovery from the Great Recession, despite a relatively strong national rebound in house prices and record low interest rates. An important determinant of residential investment is the household formation rate, which is largely driven by young adults moving out of their parents? homes after completing high school or college. New household formation can be offset when existing ...
Briefing
U.S. household deleveraging: what do the aggregate and household-level data tell us?
Deleveraging is the process by which households decide that their level of debt is inconsistent with their revised economic outlook and adjust their leverage accordingly, primarily by substituting debt repayment for consumption. Household deleveraging is a commonly cited reason for the sluggish consumption growth experienced during the current economic recovery from the Great Recession. This policy brief analyzes the impact of household debt repayment on consumer spending during and after the Great Recession by using aggregate and household-level data. Overall, the data show little evidence ...
Working Paper
The S&P 500 effect: not such good news in the long run
This paper analyzes the effect on a company's stock price when it is added to the S&P 500 Index. A simple theoretical model is developed to show how trading effects and changes to fundamentals should affect the price of S&P500 additions upon announcement and in the long run. This model predicts that a company added to the S&P500 should experience an initial price increase followed by a reversal of this price increase owing to the predicted increased stock price volatility of companies post-addition. All of these effects should be growing over time because of the increasing importance of ...
Working Paper
High-Frequency Spending Responses to Government Transfer Payments
This paper evaluates the marginal propensity to consume (MPC) out of the 2020 fiscal stimulus payments using high-frequency, transaction-level data for a sample of low-income cardholders, many of whom are unbanked. Consumers’ MPC out of non-stimulus income and their MPC out of tax refunds are estimated simultaneously. Spending responds less on impact to the stimulus payments than to non-stimulus income (15 cents versus 20 cents per dollar of income), but stimulus-payment spending quickly catches up and is noticeably higher than non-stimulus-income spending on a cumulative basis after 16 ...
Report
Labor market exit and re-entry: is the United States poised for a rebound in the labor force participation rate?
The U.S. labor force participation rate has declined sharply since 2007?far faster than can be explained by demographic shifts in the population. This brief analyzes the re-entry probability for individuals who exit the labor force as well as the financial demographic, and employment characteristics of these individuals. The vast majority of individuals under 45 years of age re-enter the labor market within four years of exiting; however, the re-entry rate drops substantially for 50?54 year-olds and 55?59 year-olds. Those individuals who exit the labor market appear more marginally attached ...
Discussion Paper
Impending U.S. spending bust?: the role of housing wealth as borrowing collateral
Using data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, this paper considers the mechanism by which changing house values impact U.S. household spending. The results suggest that house values affect consumption by serving as collateral for households to borrow against to smooth their spending. The results show that the consumption of households who need to borrow against their home equity increases by roughly 11 cents per $1.00 increase in their housing wealth. Changing house values, however, have little effect on the expenditures of households who do not need to borrow to finance their ...