Precautionary Saving and Consumption Fluctuations

Jonathan Parker and Bruce Preston

No 9196, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: This paper uses data on the expenditures of households to explain movements in the average growth rate of consumption in the U.S. from the beginning of 1982 to the end of 1997. We propose and implement a decomposition of consumption growth into series representing four proximate causes. These are new information, and three causes of predictable consumption growth: intertemporal substitution, changes in the preferences for consumption, and incomplete markets for consumption insurance. Incomplete markets for trading consumption in future states leads to statistically significant and countercyclical movements in expected consumption growth. The economic importance of precautionary saving rivals that of the real interest rate, but the relative importance of each source of movement in the volatility of consumption is not precisely measured.

JEL-codes: D91 E21 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2002-09
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-dge
Note: EFG ME
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (16)

Published as Parker, Jonathan A. and Bruce Preston. "Precautionary Saving And Consumption Fluctuations," American Economic Review, 2005, v95(4,Sep), 1119-1143.

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