Risk Exposure and Acquisition of Macroeconomic Information

Christopher Roth, Sonja Settele and Johannes Wohlfart

American Economic Review: Insights, 2022, vol. 4, issue 1, 34-53

Abstract: We conduct an experiment with a representative sample from the United States to study households' demand for macroeconomic information. Respondents who learn of a higher personal exposure to unemployment risk during recessions increase their demand for an expert forecast about the likelihood of a recession. This finding is consistent with macroeconomic models of endogenous information acquisition, according to which the demand for information depends on its expected benefits. Moreover, respondents' updating about their personal unemployment risk suggests that households are imperfectly informed about their exposure to aggregate fluctuations, which may distort their beliefs about the benefits of acquiring macroeconomic information.

JEL-codes: D12 D83 E24 E32 G01 J64 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (6)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.aeaweb.org/doi/10.1257/aeri.20200662 (application/pdf)
https://doi.org/10.3886/E131341V1 (text/html)
https://www.aeaweb.org/doi/10.1257/aeri.20200662.appx (application/pdf)
https://www.aeaweb.org/doi/10.1257/aeri.20200662.ds (application/zip)
Access to full text is restricted to AEA members and institutional subscribers.

Related works:
Working Paper: Risk Exposure and Acquisition of Macroeconomic Information (2022)
Working Paper: Risk Exposure and Acquisition of Macroeconomic Information (2021)
Working Paper: Risk Exposure and Acquisition of Macroeconomic Information (2020)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:aea:aerins:v:4:y:2022:i:1:p:34-53

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.aeaweb.org/journals/subscriptions

DOI: 10.1257/aeri.20200662

Access Statistics for this article

American Economic Review: Insights is currently edited by Amy Finkelstein

More articles in American Economic Review: Insights from American Economic Association Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Michael P. Albert ().