Will the true labor share stand up?

Peter McAdam (), Jakub Mućk and Jakub Growiec

No 1806, Working Paper Series from European Central Bank

Abstract: We document the consequences of ambiguity in the empirical definition of the macroeconomic labor share. Depending on its definition, the properties of short-run fluctuations, medium-run swings, and long-run stochastic trends of the labor share may vary substantially. Based on a range of historical US time series, we carry out a systematic exploration of discrepancies between the alternative labor share definitions in terms of the observed stochastic trends, shares of short-, medium- and long-run variation in total volatility of the series, degree of persistence, mean-reversion properties, and susceptibility to structural breaks. We conclude that while short-run properties of the labor shares (represented by cyclical variation below 8 years) are relatively consistent across all definitions, their medium-run swings (8-50 years) and long-run trends ( 50 years) diverge substantially. As important applications, we document the implications of our findings for growth accounting, the identification of short-run responses of the labor share to technology shocks and for estimating inflation. JEL Classification: C82, E25, E32

Keywords: labor share; mean reversion; persistence; spectral analysis; structural breaks (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2015-06
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-mac
Note: 50336
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (24)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.ecb.europa.eu//pub/pdf/scpwps/ecbwp1806.en.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
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:ecb:ecbwps:20151806

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Working Paper Series from European Central Bank 60640 Frankfurt am Main, Germany. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Official Publications ().