Accounting for cross-country differences in income per capita

Living standards, as measured by average income per person, vary widely across countries. Differences in income result in large disparities in spending on goods and services by people living in different economies. What makes some countries rich and others poor? Furthermore, what determines income per person in a country, and why are these factors unevenly allocated across the world? In "Accounting for Cross-Country Differences in Income Per Capita," Aubhik Khan outlines a framework for growth accounting to account for cross-country differences in income. The current consensus is that differences in per capita income across countries don't arise primarily from differences in the quantities of capital or labor, but rather from differences in the efficiency with which these factors are used.Income ; Income distribution ; Productivity

Understanding changes in aggregate business fixed investment.

Aubhik Khan explains some of the things economists have learned about how investment changes over the business cycleInvestments

The finance and growth nexus

Does financial development lead to greater economic growth? Or does economic growth lead to more highly developed financial systems? In this article, Aubhik Khan presents some recent evidence that appears to support the first question: financial development may also have a significant impact on a nation's rate of economic growth.Economic development ; Income distribution

Why are married women working more? Some macroeconomic explanations.

What accounts for the sharp increase in the number of hours worked by married women? Although the number of hours worked per person in the U.S. has changed very little over the past 60 years, the labor force has undergone some pronounced shifts over that same period. One prominent change is this sharp increase. In "Why Are Married Women Working More? Some Macroeconomic Explanations," Aubhik Khan discusses how the composition of the labor force has changed since 1945, how women's work in the marketplace has increased so dramatically, and how macroeconomists explain these changes.Women - Employment ; Employment (Economic theory)

Understanding the life-cycle of a manufacturing plant.

In the final article this quarter, Aubhik Khan wonders: What determines whether a manufacturing plant survives? Is it access to credit markets? Or does learning about plants' profitability over time determine survival? Should government policy play a role in helping plants survive? In "Understanding the Life-Cycle of a Manufacturing Plant," Khan discusses the collateral and learning views as two possible explanations for a typical plant's life-cycle. He concludes that although it remains unclear as to which explanation is more relevant, the two views have very different implications for what government can do and what it should do.Manufactures ; Plant shutdowns

Financial development and economic growth

The author develops a theory of financial development based on the costs associated with the provision of external finance. These costs are assumed to arise within an environment where informational asymmetries between borrowers and lenders are costly to resolve. When borrowing is limited, producers with access to financial intermediary loans obtain higher returns to investment than other producers. This creates incentives for others to undertake the technology adoption necessary to access investment loans. Over time, as increasing numbers of producers gain access to external finance, borrowers' net worth rises relative to debt. This reduces the costs of financial intermediation and raises the overall return on investment. The theory is consistent with recent evidence that financial development reduces the costs associated with the provision of external finance and increases the rate of economic growth. Furthermore, the theory predicts that financial development raises the retu rn on loans and reduces the spread between borrowing and lending rates.Economic development ; Financial markets ; Investments

The role of inventories in the business cycle

Changes in the stock of firms' inventories are an important component of the business cycle. In fact, discussion about the timing of a recovery following a recession often focuses on inventories. In "The Role of Inventories in the Business Cycle," Aubhik Khan surveys the facts about inventory investment over the business cycle, then discusses two leading theories that may explain these observations.Inventories ; Business cycles

Nonconvex factor adjustments in equilibrium business cycle models: Do nonlinearities matter?

Recent empirical analysis has found nonlinearities to be important in understanding aggregated investment. Using an equilibrium business cycle model, we search for aggregate nonlinearities arising from the introduction of nonconvex capital adjustment costs. We find that, while such costs lead to nontrivial nonlinearities in aggregate investment demand, equilibrium investment is effectively unchanged. Our finding, based on a model in which aggregate fluctuations arise through exogenous changes in total factor productivity, is robust to the introduction of shocks to the relative price of investment goods.Equilibrium (Economics) ; Business cycles ; Econometric models

Idiosyncratic shocks and the role of nonconvexities in plant and aggregate investment dynamics

We solve equilibrium models of lumpy investment wherein establishments face persistent shocks to common and plant-specific productivity. Nonconvex adjustment costs lead plants to pursue generalized (S, s) rules with respect to capital; thus, their investments are lumpy. In partial equilibrium, this yields substantial skewness and kurtosis in aggregate investment, though, with differences in plant-level productivity, these nonlinearities are far less pronounced. Moreover, nonconvex costs, like quadratic adjustment costs, increase the persistence of aggregate investment, yielding a better match with the data. In general equilibrium, aggregate nonlinearities disappear, and investment rates are very persistent, regardless of adjustment costs. While the aggregate implications of lumpy investment change substantially in equilibrium, the inclusion of fixed costs or idiosyncratic shocks makes the average distribution of plant investment rates largely invariant to market-clearing movements in real wages and interest rates. Nonetheless, we find that understanding the dynamics of plant-level investment requires general equilibrium analysis.Capital investments ; Business enterprises ; Investments

Growth and Risk-Sharing with Private Information

We examine the impact of incomplete risk-sharing on growth and welfare. The source of market incompleteness in our economy is private information: a household's idiosyncratic productivity shock is not observable by others. Risk-sharing between households occurs through long-term contracts with intermediaries. We find that incomplete risk- sharing tends to reduce the rate of growth relative to the complete risk sharing benchmark. Numerical examples indicate the contracts are relatively efficient and that the growth effects of private information are small.growth, long-term contracts, risk-sharing