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Matthew N. White
- 13 October 2020
- RESEARCH BULLETIN - No. 75Details
- Abstract
- The 2020 US CARES Act (Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security) aimed to bolster consumer spending. We model the spending and saving behaviour of households during the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, differentiating between the employed, temporarily unemployed and persistently unemployed, and examine how the CARES Act should affect this behaviour. To do this we use a benchmark model which realistically captures the differences in income, wealth and spending between households, and which matches the responses to previous stimulus policies well. We extend the model to account for the fact that, during a lockdown, many types of spending are undesirable or impossible, and that some of the jobs that disappear during lockdown will not reappear when it is lifted. We estimate that, in the case of a short-lived lockdown (which was the median point of view in April 2020), the CARES Act should be sufficient to allow a swift recovery in consumer spending to its pre-crisis levels. For a longer-lasting lockdown (if there is a “second wave” of the virus), an extension of enhanced unemployment benefits is likely to be necessary for consumption spending to recover quickly. We have made the modelling software available for other researchers, so that they can examine the consequences of alternative assumptions about the length of the lockdown, distribution of the stimulus payments, and other modelling choices.
- JEL Code
- E31 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles→Price Level, Inflation, Deflation
E32 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles→Business Fluctuations, Cycles
E37 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles→Forecasting and Simulation: Models and Applications
E52 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit→Monetary Policy
- 8 July 2020
- WORKING PAPER SERIES - No. 2441Details
- Abstract
- To predict the effects of the 2020 U.S. ‘CARES’ act on consumption, we extend a model that matches responses of households to past consumption stimulus packages. The extension allows us to account for two novel features of the coronavirus crisis. First, during the lockdown, many types of spending are undesirable or impossible. Second, some of the jobs that disappear during the lockdown will not reappear when it is lifted. We estimate that, if the lockdown is short-lived, the combination of expanded unemployment insurance benefits and stimulus payments should be sufficient to allow a swift recovery in consumer spending to its pre-crisis levels. If the lockdown lasts longer, an extension of enhanced unemployment benefits will likely be necessary if consumption spending is to recover.
- JEL Code
- D83 : Microeconomics→Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty→Search, Learning, Information and Knowledge, Communication, Belief
D84 : Microeconomics→Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty→Expectations, Speculations
E21 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Consumption, Saving, Production, Investment, Labor Markets, and Informal Economy→Consumption, Saving, Wealth
E32 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles→Business Fluctuations, Cycles
- 25 May 2018
- WORKING PAPER SERIES - No. 2152Details
- Abstract
- Macroeconomic models often invoke consumption "habits" to explain the substantial persistence of macroeconomic consumption growth. to explain the substantial But a large literature has found no evidence of habits in the micro-economic datasets that measure the behavior of individual households. We show that the apparent conflict can be explained by a model in which consumers have accurate knowledge of their personal circumstances but `sticky expectations' about the macro-economy. In our model, the persistence of aggregate consumption growth reflects consumers' imperfect attention to aggregate shocks. Our proposed degree of (macro) inattention has negligible utility costs, because aggregate shocks constitute only a tiny proportion of the uncertainty that consumers face.
- JEL Code
- D83 : Microeconomics→Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty→Search, Learning, Information and Knowledge, Communication, Belief
D84 : Microeconomics→Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty→Expectations, Speculations
E21 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Consumption, Saving, Production, Investment, Labor Markets, and Informal Economy→Consumption, Saving, Wealth
E32 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles→Business Fluctuations, Cycles