The Missing Intercept: A Demand Equivalence Approach&DAG;

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Wolf, Christian K.
• 署名单位: Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT); National Bureau of Economic Research
• 刊物名称: AMERICAN ECONOMIC REVIEW
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0002-8282
• DOI: 10.1257/aer.20211751
• 发表日期: 2023
• 页码: 2232-2269
• 关键词: economic stimulus payments; monetary-policy; fiscal-policy; precautionary savings; business cycles; INVESTMENT; shocks; consumption; models; identification

摘要

I give conditions under which changes in private spending are accommodated in general equilibrium exactly like changes in aggre-gate fiscal expenditure. Under such demand equivalence, research-ers can use time series evidence on fiscal multipliers to recover the general equilibrium missing intercept of shocks to private spend-ing identified in the cross section. Through the lens of this theory, time series estimates of a fiscal multiplier around one suggest a miss-ing intercept close to zero-an observation that I illustrate with an application to the 2008 tax rebates. I also discuss the robustness of this aggregation approach to plausible violations of demand equiva-lence. (JEL E12, E21, E24, E62, G51, H24, H31)