Accounting for the Rise in Consumer Bankruptcies
用异质性代理人生命周期模型分析美国个人破产率从1970年到2002年大幅上升的原因，发现信贷市场环境变化（贷款交易成本和破产成本下降）是主因，而非收入不确定性或废除高利贷法。
Personal bankruptcies in the United States have increased dramatically, rising from 1.4 per thousand working age adults in 1970 to 8.5 in 2002. We use a heterogeneous agent life-cycle model with competitive lenders to evaluate several commonly offered explanations. We find that increased uncertainty (income shocks, expense uncertainty) cannot account quantitatively for the rise in bankruptcies. Instead, the rise in filings appears mainly to reflect changes in the credit market environment: a decrease in the transaction cost of lending and in the cost of bankruptcy. We also argue that the abolition of usury laws and other legal changes were unimportant.