 Rent-seeking in an emerging market: A DSGE approachCelso Costa Junior and Alejandro C. Garcia-Cintado Economic Systems, 2021, vol. 45, issue 2 Abstract: Due to the fact that rent-seeking is by definition an unobservable variable, measuring its size and evolution over the business cycle can be a daunting challenge. In this article, by embedding rent-seeking behavior in an otherwise standard open-economy DSGE model, we are able to derive a quarterly time series of this variable (expressed as a percentage deviation from the trend) for an emerging economy such as Brazil. The estimated series, spanning the period 2002Q1−2017Q4, shows a strong positive correlation with the “Commodity Super Cycle” of the 2000 decade and falls as a result of some political scandals and their ensuing investigations, among other driving forces. We also rely on the same model to assess how several shocks hitting the economy affect both rent-seeking and the relevant macroeconomic variables in our model. Barring monetary expansions, increased exports and higher income transfers to households, expansionary shocks are associated with lower rent-seeking activity. Factoring in these two sets of results, the upshot is that rent-seeking behavior shows a pattern of procyclicality in the Brazilian economy. Keywords: Rent-seeking; Rent extraction; Privilege; Taxation; Public spending; DSGE model (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:ecosys:v:45:y:2021:i:2:s0939362520300820 DOI: 10.1016/j.ecosys.2020.100775 Access Statistics for this article Economic Systems is currently edited by R. Frensch More articles in Economic Systems from Elsevier Contact information at EDIRC. |
Is your work missing from RePEc? Here is how to contribute.
Questions or problems? Check the EconPapers FAQ or send mail to .
EconPapers is hosted by the
School of Business at Örebro University.