Economics Working Papers

"Does Money Matter in Inflation Forecasting?" (2009-06-25)
by Jane M. Binner, Peter Tino, Jonathan Tepper, Richard G. Anderson, Barry Jones, and Graham Kendall
Working Paper 2009-030A. This paper provides the most fully comprehensive evidence to date on whether or not monetary aggregates are valuable for forecasting US inflation in the early to mid 2000s. More...

"Speculative Bubbles and Financial Crisis" (2009-06-16)
by Pengfei Wang, and Yi Wen
Working Paper 2009-029A. Why are asset prices so much more volatile and so often detached from their fundamentals? Why does the burst of financial bubbles depress the real economy? More...

"Capital Misallocation and Aggregate Factor Productivity" (2009-06-16)
by Costas Azariadis, and Leo Kaas
Working Paper 2009-028A. We propose a sectoral–shift theory of aggregate factor productivity for a class of economies with AK technologies, limited loan enforcement, a constant production possibilities frontier, and finitely many sectors producing the same good. More...

"Casino Revenue and the Illinois Smoking Ban" (2009-06-05)
by Thomas A. Garrett, and Michael R. Pakko
Working Paper 2009-027A. Smoking was banned in all Illinois casinos in January 2008. We explore the effects that the smoking ban has had on Illinois casino revenue and attendance. More...

"An Analytical Approach to Buffer-Stock Saving" (2009-06-03)
by Yi Wen
Working Paper 2009-026A. The profession has been longing for closed-form solutions to consumption functions under uncertainty and borrowing constraints. This paper proposes an analytical approach to solving buffer-stock saving models with both idiosyncratic and aggregate uncertainties. More...