Can Permanent-Income Theory Explain Cross-Sectional Consumption Patterns?
检验弗里德曼永久收入假说对横截面消费-收入比下降的预测，发现即使最严格的消费平滑模型也无法解释实际数据的偏态，暗示收入测量误差或其他异常因素在起作用。
The prediction that consumption-income ratios should decline as income rises in cross-sectional data is a feature of Friedman's (1957) permanent income hypothesis and other consumption-smoothing models. The theory thus provides a link between longitudinal income data and cross-sectional expenditure data: given measured income variability and a functional relationship between consumption and permanent income, we predict cross-sectional expenditure patterns and compare those predictions to actual values. Our approach cannot explain the actual skewness in consumption-income ratios under even the strictest consumption-smoothing model, which implies that income measurement error or other anomalies are affecting the data. © 2000 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology