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The Tail that Wags the Economy: Beliefs and Persistent Stagnation

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  • Julian Kozlowski
  • Laura Veldkamp
  • Venky Venkateswaran
Abstract
The Great Recession was a deep downturn with long-lasting effects on credit, employment and output. While narratives about its causes abound, the persistence of GDP below pre-crisis trends remains puzzling. We propose a simple persistence mechanism that can be quantified and combined with existing models. Our key premise is that agents don't know the true distribution of shocks, but use data to estimate it non-parametrically. Then, transitory events, especially extreme ones, generate persistent changes in beliefs and macro outcomes. Embedding this mechanism in a neoclassical model, we find that it endogenously generates persistent drops in economic activity after tail events.

Suggested Citation

  • Julian Kozlowski & Laura Veldkamp & Venky Venkateswaran, 2019. "The Tail that Wags the Economy: Beliefs and Persistent Stagnation," Working Papers 2019-6, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis.
    • Handle: RePEc:fip:fedlwp:2019-006
    DOI: 10.20955/wp.2019.006
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Stagnation; tail risks; propagation; belief-driven business cycles;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D84 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Expectations; Speculations
    • E32 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Business Fluctuations; Cycles

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