Year: 2022
Type: article
Abstract: Since the Global Financial Crisis, interest in financial cycles has risen significantly. While much of modern macroeconomics conceives financial crises as the results of exogenous shocks, Minsky’s financial instability hypothesis posits that financial cycles are endogenous to the economic system. The main contribution of this paper is to use historical macroeconomic data for the United States (1889–2014) to econometrically test for endogenous Minsky cycles: the interaction of procyclical private debt-to-income ratios and a dampening effect of private debt on economic activity. We analyze corporate debt-gross domestic product (GDP) growth cycles, which feature in Minsky’s original writings, and mortgage debt-GDP growth cycles as in some recent Minsky-inspired models. We find robust evidence of endogenous corporate debt-GDP cycles over the last 125 years. These results are driven by the pre-World War II (WWII), and post-1973 periods, which had a more liberal economic policy orientation. We find no evidence of mortgage debt-GDP cycles.
Source: Industrial and Corporate Change
DOI: 10.1093/icc/dtac043
Authors: Engelbert Stockhammer, Giorgos Gouzoulis
Institutions: King's College London, University of Bristol
Language: English
Topic: Economic Theory and Policy
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: hybrid
Estimated APC paid: $3,694
Award: G6299835192
OpenAlex ID: W4296781174