Tfp, News, and “Sentiments”: the International Transmission of Business Cycles
提出一种识别非技术商业周期冲击(称为“情绪”)的方法,发现美国情绪冲击解释了美国短期商业周期波动的大部分,并显著影响加拿大宏观经济,在短期比全要素生产率冲击更重要。
Abstract We propose a novel identification scheme for a nontechnology business cycle shock, which we label “sentiment”. This is a shock orthogonal to identified surprise and news TFP shocks that maximize the short-run forecast error variance of an expectational variable, alternatively a GDP forecast or a consumer confidence index. We then estimate the international transmission of three identified shocks—surprise TFP, news of future TFP, and sentiment—from the United States to Canada. The US sentiment shock produces a business cycle in the United States, with output, hours, and consumption rising following a positive shock, and accounts for the bulk of the US short-run business cycle fluctuations. The sentiment shock also has a significant impact on Canadian macroaggregates. In the short run, it is more important than either the surprise or the news TFP shocks in generating business cycle comovement between the United States and Canada, accounting for over 40% of the forecast error variance of Canadian GDP and over one-third of Canadian hours, imports, and exports. The news shock is responsible for some comovement at 5–10 years, and surprise TFP innovations do not generate synchronization. We provide a simple theoretical framework to illustrate how the US sentiment shocks can transmit to Canada.