Uncertainty and Information Acquisition: Evidence from Firms and Households

Heiner Mikosch, Christopher Roth, Samad Sarferaz and Johannes Wohlfart
Additional contact information
Samad Sarferaz: KOF and ETH Zurich
Johannes Wohlfart: Department of Economics and CEBI

No 21-20, CEBI working paper series from University of Copenhagen. Department of Economics. The Center for Economic Behavior and Inequality (CEBI)

Abstract: We leverage the small open economy Switzerland as a testing ground for basic premises of macroeconomic models of endogenous information acquisition, using tailored surveys of firms and households. First, we show that firms perceive a greater exposure to exchange rate movements than households, which is reflected in higher levels of information acquisition and less dispersed beliefs about past and future exchange rate realizations. Similarly, within the two samples, acquisition of exchange rate information strongly increases in various proxies for stake size. Second, households who perceive higher costs of acquiring or processing information acquire less information. Finally, an exogenous increase in the perceived uncertainty of the exchange rate increases firms’ demand for a report about exchange rate developments, but not households’. Our findings inform the modeling of information frictions in macroeconomics.

Keywords: Information acquisition; Uncertainty; Stake Size; Firms; Households (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D12 D14 D83 D84 E32 G11 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 81
Date: 2021-12-01
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cwa and nep-mac
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (6)

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Related works:
Journal Article: Uncertainty and Information Acquisition: Evidence from Firms and Households (2024)
Working Paper: Uncertainty and Information Acquisition: Evidence from Firms and Households (2021)
Working Paper: Uncertainty and Information Acquisition: Evidence from Firms and Households (2021)
Working Paper: Uncertainty and Information Acquisition: Evidence from Firms and Households (2021)
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