The role of preference shocks and capital utilization in the great depression

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Weder, Mark
• 署名单位: University of Adelaide
• 刊物名称: INTERNATIONAL ECONOMIC REVIEW
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0020-6598
• DOI: 10.1111/j.1468-2354.2006.00412.x
• 发表日期: 2006
• 页码: 1247-1268
• 关键词: business-cycle; UNITED-STATES; PRODUCTIVITY

摘要

The article examines the proposition that preference shocks play a central role in our understanding of the Great Depression. I identify a series of unusually large negative shocks that destabilized the U.S. economy during the 1930s. When the artificial economy is paired with variable capital utilization and mildly increasing returns to scale in production, it is able to account for most of the decline in economic activity and it predicts a tepid recovery.