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                                                                                    Working Paper
                                                                                
                                            Identification Using Higher-Order Moments Restrictions
                                        
                                        
                                        
                                        
                                                                                    
                                                                                                    We exploit inequality restrictions on higher-order moments of the distribution of structural shocks to sharpen their identification. We show that these constraints can be treated as necessary conditions and used to shrink the set of admissible rotations. We illustrate the usefulness of this approach showing, by simulations, how it can dramatically improve the identification of monetary policy shocks when combined with widely used sign-restriction schemes. We then apply our methodology to two empirical questions: the effects of monetary policy shocks in the U.S. and the effects of sovereign ...
                                                                                                
                                            
                                                                                
                                    
                                                                                    Working Paper
                                                                                
                                            Higher-order Moment Inequality Restrictions for SVARs
                                        
                                        
                                        
                                        
                                                                                    
                                                                                                    We introduce a method that exploits some non-Gaussian features of structural shocks to identify structural vector autoregression (SVAR) models. More specifically, we propose combining inequality restrictions on the higher-order moments of the structural shocks of interest with other set-identifying constraints, typically sign restrictions. We illustrate how, in both large and small sample settings, higher-order moment restrictions considerably narrow the identification of monetary policy shocks compared with what is obtained with minimal sign restrictions typically used in the SVAR ...