UNDERSTANDING INVESTMENT IRREVERSIBILITY IN GENERAL EQUILIBRIUM

This paper advances a tractable model designed to understand investment irreversibility in general equilibrium. The tractability of the model allows analytical results which explain the contrast, emphasized in the extant literature (e.g., Coleman [1997]), between the consequences of irreversibility for individual firms and the consequences of irreversibility for the whole economy. In general equilibrium, irreversibility affects both the wealth of consumers and the return on assets. In the model explored, as long as the inter-temporal elasticity of substitution is realistically low (less than one), investment irreversibility not only prevents capital destruction, but it also induces capital creation. Furthermore, under certain conditions, irreversibility raises the risk premium by increasing the variability of both consumption and the market portfolio.Irreversible Investment, Stochastic Growth, Asset Pricing

DIVISIBLE MONEY IN AN ECONOMY WITH VILLAGES

This paper provides a tractable search model with divisible money that encompasses the two frameworks currently used in the literature. Individuals belong to many villages. Inside a village, individuals know each other so financial contracts are feasible. Money is essential to facilitate trade across villages. When financial markets inside a village are complete, the model generalizes the framework advanced by Lagos and Wright (2005) without having to assume quasi-linear preferences. Likewise, complete financial markets in each village substitutes for the representative household in the framework advanced by Shi (1997). The paper describes sets of financial arrangements that complete the markets inside the villages. In general, these financial arrangements include a combination of credit and insurance. However, if individuals choose period by period the trading role they play outside their village, then under some parametric restrictions either a lottery or a risk-free bond market are sufficient.monetary search, divisible money

ASSET PRICING, GROWTH, AND THE BUSINESS CYCLE WITH IRREVERSIBLE INVESTMENT

This paper advances a simple model that emphasizes the diversity of capital types, some of these types are long lived, while others are highly specific. This modeling of capital implies that irreversibility constraints may be strongly binding, thus generating sizable capital losses, even with moderate shocks and positive aggregate investment. The resulting riskiness of investing in capital has consequences for growth, the business cycle, and asset returns. Growth is affected as the representative consumer invests a larger portion of output as a form of self-insurance. The business cycle is affected as consumption becomes more variable. The asset returns are affected as the added risk raises its premium, specially in recessions. The focus of the paper is to evaluate the quantitative importance of these effects. When evaluated, the model is capable of matching the most prominent characteristics of U.S. output, consumption, and asset returns, including a wide equity premium. However, this is not a resolution to the equity premium puzzle as the paper does not address why the representative consumer has the high risk aversion necessary to match these observed time series.

Divisible Money in an Economy with Villages

This paper provides a tractable search model with divisible money that encompasses the two frameworks currently used in the literature. In the model, individuals belong to many villages. Inside a village, individuals are not altruistic as in a representative household, but they share information so financial contracts are feasible. Money is essential in the model to facilitate trade with individuals outside the village. The framework proposed by Lagos and Wright (2002) arises as a special case if some goods trade in competitive markets while others trade in search markets, and preferences are quasi-linear. The framework proposed by Shi (1997) arises as a special case if individuals can insure trading risks inside the village. In general, if preferences are not quasi-linear and trading risks cannot be insured, the distribution of money holdings is non-degenerate and monetary transfers have distributional effects. However, neither quasi-linear preferences nor insurance of trading risks are necessary for tractability. Indeed, this paper advances a tractable benchmark with an endogenous frequency of shopping in which all buyers choose to carry the same amount of money even if preferences are not quasi-linear and trading risks cannot be insuredmonetary search, divisible money

A Search Theory of Money and Commerce with Neoclassical Production

This paper advances a highly tractable model with search theoretic foundations for money and neoclassical growth. In the model, manufacturing and commerce are distinct and separate activities. In manufacturing, goods are efficiently produced combining capital and labor. In commerce, goods are exchanged in bilateral meetings. The model is applied to study the effects of in ation on capital accumulation and welfare. With realistic parameters, in ation has large negative effects on welfare even though it raises capital and output. In contrast, with cash-in-advance, a device informally motivated with bilateral trading, in ation depresses capital and output and has a negligible effecton welfare. (Keywords: search, money, commerce, in ation, neoclassical production, capital accumulation, optimum quantity of money.)search, money, commerce, in;ation, neoclassical production, capital accumulation, optimum quantity of money.

Inflation, Prices, and Information in Competitive Search

We study the effects of inflation in a competitive search model where each buyer’s utility is private information, and money is essential. The equilibrium is efficient at the Friedman rule, but inflation creates an inefficiency in the terms of trade. Buyers experience a preference shock after they are matched with a seller, and thus they have a precautionary motive for holding money. Sellers, who compete to attract buyers, post non-linear price schedules. As inflation rises, sellers post relatively flat price schedules, which reduce the need for precautionary balances. These price schedules induce buyers with a low desire to consume to purchase inefficiently high quantities because of the low marginal cost of purchasing goods. In contrast, buyers with a high desire to consume purchase inefficiently low quantities as they face binding liquidity constraints. The model fits historical US data on velocity and interest rates.Publicad

Precautionary balances and the velocity of circulation of money

Inflation, as a tax on money, gives buyers an incentive to reduce their money balances. Sellers are aware of this incentive and try to attract buyers by announcing price offers that induce buyers to spend a larger fraction of their money. We examine the effect of inflation on equilibrium price offers and associated trades in a competitive search environment where buyers experience preference shocks after they are matched with a seller. With full information,equilibrium price offers consist of a flat fee applied equally to all buyers independently of the quantities they purchase. If buyers'preferences are private information, sellers must charge more to buyers who purchase larger quantities due to incentive compatibility restrictions. In this case, equilibrium price offers consist of a non-linear price schedule. However, as inflation rises, price schedules become relatively flat. This implies that buyers with a low desire to consume purchase higher quantities and spend their cash more rapidly. Buyers with a high desire to consume purchase lower quantities because, as their money balances fall, they become liquidity constrained. This is in contrast with the full information benchmark where inflation reduces the quantities purchased by all buyers. The equilibrium is efficient at the Friedman rule and inflation reduces welfare both with full and private information

Inflation, Prices, and Information in Competitive Search

We study the effects of inflation in a competitive search model where each buyer's utility is private information, and where money is essential in facilitating trade. The equilibrium is efficient at the Friedman rule, but inflation creates an inefficiency in the terms of trade. Buyers experience a preference shock after they are matched with a seller, and thus they have a precautionary motive for holding money. Sellers, who compete to attract buyers, post non-linear price schedules to screen out different types of buyers. As inflation rises, sellers post relatively flat price schedules which reduce the need for buyers to hold precautionary balances. These price schedules induce buyers with a low desire to consume to purchase inefficiently high quantities because of the low marginal cost of purchasing goods. In contrast, buyers with a high desire to consume purchase inefficiently low quantities as they face binding liquidity constraints. The reduction of precautionary balances as inflation rises allows the model to fit historical US data on velocity and interest rates.inflation; precautionary money demand; competitive search; private information.

INFLATION, PRICES, AND INFORMATION IN COMPETITIVE SEARCH

Inflation, as a tax on money, induces buyers to reduce their money balances. Sellers are aware of this, so to attract costumers, they post price offers that reduce the need for buyers to carry precautionary money balances. We study this effect of inflation in a competitive search environment where buyers experience preference shocks after they are matched with a seller. With full information, equilibrium price offers consist of a flat fee which is independent of the quantities purchased. With private information of buyers' preferences, equilibrium price offers are restricted by incentive compatibility constraints. As a result, the price schedule that maps quantities purchased onto payments must be increasing. As inflation rises, these price schedules become relatively flat, so the marginal cost of purchasing goods is low. Consequently, buyers that are not liquidity constrained (with a low desire to consume) purchase inefficiently large quantities. Meanwhile, buyers with a high desire to consume typically purchase inefficiently low quantities because, as their money balances fall, they become liquidity constrained. This is in contrast with the full information benchmark where inflation reduces the quantities purchased by all buyers.

Scarce Collateral and Bank Reserves

If collateral for bank loans is scarce and as a result access to secured loans is restricted, the allocation of resources is inefficient. Anticipating future borrowing constraints, individuals over-invest in collateralized types of capital, whereas consumption and investment expenditures are inefficiently low while individuals are borrowing constrained. The dual counterpart of this misallocation of resources is inefficiently low interest rates. In this situation, bank reserves play a positive welfare role by increasing not only bank lending rates, but also, paradoxically, bank deposit rates. As a result, in economies with scarce collateral the optimal reserves requirement ratio is positive.collateral, banking, reserves, borrowing constraint, reserves requirement.