Citation

Discussion Paper Details

Please find the details for DP10463 in an easy to copy and paste format below:

Full Details

Title: Quantifying Confidence

Author(s): George-Marios Angeletos, Fabrice Collard and Harris Dellas

Publication Date: March 2015

Keyword(s): aggregate demand, business cycles, confidence, coordination failure, DSGE models, higher-order beliefs and strategic uncertainty

Programme Area(s): International Macroeconomics

Abstract: We enrich workhorse macroeconomic models with a mechanism that proxies strategic uncertainty and that manifests itself as waves of optimism and pessimism about the short-term economic outlook. We interpret this mechanism as variation in "confidence" and show that it helps account for many salient features of the data; it drives a significant fraction of the volatility in estimated models that allow for multiple structural shocks; it captures a type of fluctuations in "aggregate demand" that does not rest on nominal rigidities; and it calls into question existing interpretations of the observed recessions. We complement these findings with evidence that most of the business cycle in the data is captured by an empirical factor which is unlike certain structural forces that are popular in the literature but similar to the one we formalize here.

For full details and related downloads, please visit: https://cepr.org/active/publications/discussion_papers/dp.php?dpno=10463

Bibliographic Reference

Angeletos, G, Collard, F and Dellas, H. 2015. 'Quantifying Confidence'. London, Centre for Economic Policy Research. https://cepr.org/active/publications/discussion_papers/dp.php?dpno=10463