Econ Papers Daily / 期刊论文
颗粒世界中的投资不可逆性
Investment irreversibility in a granular world
摘要
We show that investment irreversibility plays a prominent role in shaping aggregate fluctuations in a granular economy, characterized by a fat-tailed distribution of non-atomistic firms. Such an economy satisfies two conditions necessary for irreversibility to matter for aggregate fluctuations: idiosyncratic shocks volatile enough to bind the irreversibility constraint cyclically for a mass of large firms, and a failure of the law of large numbers that prevents firm-level fluctuations from washing out in the aggregate. Through both a direct misallocation channel and an indirect general equilibrium channel, irreversibility dampens the volatility of output, investment, and hours while amplifying the volatility of consumption. Eliminating the friction yields a consumption-equivalent welfare gain of 1.83%; however, merely subsidizing capital liquidation reduces welfare by 0.59%, because firms, compensated by the government, do not internalize the aggregate resource losses and therefore over-disinvest.
中文摘要
我们表明，投资不可逆性在塑造由非原子型企业厚尾分布所特征的颗粒经济中的总量波动方面发挥着显著作用。这样的经济满足两个条件，这些条件对于不可逆性影响总量波动是必要的：异质性冲击足够剧烈，以至于周期性地使大量大型企业面临不可逆性约束的约束；以及大数定律的失效，这阻止了企业层面的波动在总量中消失。通过直接的错配渠道和间接的一般均衡渠道，不可逆性抑制了产出、投资和工时的波动性，同时放大了消费的波动性。消除这一摩擦可带来相当于消费的1.83%的福利增益；然而，仅仅补贴资本清算会降低福利0.59%，因为企业在政府补偿下并未内部化总量资源损失，从而过度撤资。