Fabio Canova

Inequality and convergence in Europe’s regions: reconsidering European regional policies

Europes regions Income disparities and regional policies In this paper we take a critical look at current European regional policies. First, we document the motivation for such policies, that is, the large income disparities across the regions of the EU15. Large disparities are certainly present. Second, we illustrate the various instruments adopted and discuss their underpinnings in established economic theories. Next, we look at available data, searching for three kinds of evidence: (1) if disparities are either growing or decreasing, we conclude they are neither; (2) which are the major factors explaining such disparities and, in particular, if they are the factors predicted by the economic models adopted by the Commission to justify current policies, we conclude this is most certainly not the case; (3) if there are clear signs that EU policies, as opposed to other social and economic factors, are actually reducing such disparities, we cannot find any clear sign of such desired impact. Our conclusion is that regional and structural policies serve mostly a redistributional purpose, motivated by the nature of the political equilibria upon which the European Union is built. They have little relationship with fostering economic growth. This casts a serious doubt on their social value and, furthermore, strongly questions extending such policies to future members of the European Union. A successful EU enlargement, in our view, calls for an immediate and drastic revision of regional economic policies. — Michele Boldrin and Fabio Canova

Monetary Disturbances Matter for Business Fluctuations in the G-7

This paper examines the importance of monetary disturbances for cyclical fluctuations in real activity and inflation. It employs a novel identification approach which uses the sign of the cross correlation function in response to shocks to assign a structural interpretation to orthogonal innovations. We find that monetary shocks significantly drive output and inflation cycles in all G-7 countries; that they are the dominant source of fluctuations in three of the seven countries; that they contain an important policy component, and that their impact is time varying.

Trade interdependence and the international business cycle

A stochastic, general equilibrium model of the world economy is developed to analyze the contribution of trade interdependence to international business cycles. We test some of the implications of the model using data from ten major industrial countries and a variety of detrending techniques to calculate the cyclical component of output. We find that the significance of trade in the transmission of economic disturbances across countries is not robust to the choice of the detrending method. In general, the role of trade interdependence is moderate and seem to have been stronger in the period before 1973.

Estimating Multicountry VAR Models

This article presents a method to estimate the coefficients, to test specification hypotheses, and to conduct policy exercises in multicountry Vector Autoregressive (VAR) models with cross-unit interdependencies, unit-specific dynamics, and time variations in the coefficients. The framework of analysis is Bayesian: A prior flexibly reduces the dimensionality of the model and puts structure on the time variations, Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) methods are used to obtain posterior distributions, and marginal likelihoods to check the fit of various specifications. Impulse responses and conditional forecasts are obtained with the output of an MCMC routine. The transmission of certain shocks across countries is analyzed.

Detrending and business cycle facts: A user's guide

This note argues that it is hardly the case that the profession is fully aware that the application of di⁄erent filters to the data leads to di⁄erent outcomes and that we have enough evidence to claim that these di⁄erences are unimportant to evaluate the fit models to the data. ( 1998 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved. JEL classification: B41; E32

Sources and propagation of international output cycles: Common shocks or transmission?

This paper studies the generation and the transmission of international business cycles in a multi-country model with production and consumption interdependencies. Two sources of disturbances are considered and three channels for propagation of shocks are compared. Simulations are performed for symmetric countries and for countries that differ either in preferences, technologies, fiscal policies, wealth or exogenous processes. Production interdependencies determine the charateristics of the propagation of technology shocks while consumption interdependencies are responsible for the transmission of government shocks. Government shocks that are mildly correlated across countries are more successful than technology shocks in reproducing actual data.

Price Differentials in Monetary Unions: The Role of Fiscal Shocks*

We study the effect of regional expenditure and revenue shocks on price differentials for 47 US states and 9 EU countries. We identify shocks using sign restrictions on the dynamics of expenditures, revenues, deficits and output and construct two estimates for structural price differentials dynamics, one for the average and one for each unit, which optimally weight information contained in the data for all units. On average, expansionary fiscal disturbances produce positive, while distortionary balance budget shocks produce negative price differential responses. The negative price differentials responses in some units is partially explained by spillovers and labour supply effects.

Does Detrending Matter for the Determination of the Reference Cycle and the Selection of Turning Points

Recent research in contract theory views ownership as a substitute for complete contracts. Here, this approach is applied to monetary integration. Countries face a coordination problem conducting monetary policy. Negative spillovers ensure uncoordinated policy generates too high inflation. Ex ante, policymakers can undertake politically costly economic reform. This has a positive spillover because it improves the outcome of the monetary policy game. Ex post contracting over policy may be possible, but it supposed that ex ante contracting over reform and monetary policy is not. This paper analyzes when monetary union is a good substitute for this inability to commit.

International Consumption Risk Sharing

This paper formally examines the implications of international consumption risk sharing for a panel of industrialized countries. The authors theoretically derive the international consumption insurance proposition in a simple setup and show how to modify it in more complicated models. They analyze the implications of the theory for pairs of countries and find that aggregate domestic consumption is almost completely insured against idiosyncratic real, demographic, fiscal, and monetary shocks over short cycles but that it covaries with these variables over medium and long cycles. The cross equation restrictions imposed by the theory are rejected. The policy implications are discussed. Copyright 1996 by Economics Department of the University of Pennsylvania and the Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association.

Forecasting and Turning Point Predictions in a Bayesian Panel VAR Model

We provide methods for forecasting variables and predicting turning points in panel Bayesian VARs. We specify a flexible model which accounts for both interdependencies in the cross section and time variations in the parameters. Posterior distributions for the parameters are obtained for a particular type of diffuse, for Minnesota-type and for hierarchical priors. Formulas for multistep, multiunit point and average forecasts are provided. An application to the problem of forecasting the growth rate of output and of predicting turning points in the G-7 illustrates the approach. A comparison with alternative forecasting methods is also provided.