This paper examines an economy in which aggregate shocks are not dispersed equally throughout the population. Instead, while these shocks affect all individuals ex ante, they are concentrated among a few ex post. The equity premium in genera) depends on the concentration of these aggregate shocks; it follows that one cannot estimate the degree of risk aversion from aggregate data alone. These findings suggest that the empirical usefulness of aggregation theorems for capital asset pricing models is limited. 1.

This paper analyzes productive government expenditure in a stochastic AK growth

This paper examines intertemporal risk–taking in a stochastically growing economy with externalities in human capital accumulation where agents have preferences for social status. In order to isolate the effects of status concerns on long–run expected growth, the analysis is embedded in a nonexpected utility setting, which disentangles the effects from risk aversion and intertemporal substitution. We examine the interaction between status desire and risk, risk aversion and intertemporal substitution. The externalities generated by the status game are able to correct the allocative distortions from the knowledge spillovers.

The views expressed in this paper are those of the authors. No responsibility for them should be attributed to the Bank of Canada. iii Table of Contents Acknowledgements.................................................................................................................... iv Abstract / Résumé....................................................................................................................... v 1. Introduction............................................................................................................................ 1

We analyze bidding behavior in auctions when risk-averse buyers bid for a good whose value is risky. We show that when the risk in the valuations increases, DARA bidders will reduce their bids by more than the appropriate increase in the risk premium. Ceteris paribus, buyers will be better off bidding for a more risky object in first price, second price, and English auctions with affiliated common (interdependent) values. This “precautionary bidding ” effect arises because the expected marginal utility of income increases with risk, so buyers are reluctant to bid so highly. We also show that precautionary bidding behavior can make DARA bidders prefer bidding in a common values setting to bidding in a private values one when risk-neutral or CARA bidders would be indifferent. Thus the potential for a “winner’s curse ” can be a blessing for rational DARA bidders.

findings expressed here, however, are those of the author and should not be attributed to the World Bank, IFPRI or any of their member countries. A previous version of this paper circulated under the title “Risk and Household Structure: Despite a large literature on fertility and education there has been little research on how these joint decisions are affected by risks and shocks. This paper uses data on hurricanes in Guatemala combined with a household survey to analyse how households ’ decisions on fertility and investments in education respond to both risk and shocks. The data on hurricanes cover the period 1880 to 1997 and allow for the calculation of hurricane risk by municipality. An increase in risk leads to higher fertility for households with land, while households without land reduce fertility. For both types of households higher risk is associated with higher education but the effect is largest for households without land. Negative shocks lead to decreases in both fertility and education. There is a compensatory effect later in life for fertility, but not for education, indicating that births “lost ” to shocks can be made up but lost schooling cannot. The most convincing explanation for these patterns is parents ’ need for insurance.

This paper studies effects of two classes of borrowing constraints, collateraland income-based, on wealth accumulation, portfolio behavior and on precautionary motives. We examine the sensitivity of solutions to tightness of constraints, education level, and preference parameters. The models are calibrated using the 1992 Survey of Consumer Finances. The idea that constrained households engage in less borrowing and less holding of risky assets than desired is borne out for income-based constraints but not necessarily for constraints where assets also serve as collateral. The commonly used nonnegativity constraint on wealth turns out to be a very special case among collateral constraints: not only is constrained consumption equal to income but precautionary wealth holding is zero. Income-based constraints reverse the sign of precautionary effects on holdings of risky assets, and so do relatively tight collateral constraints. The latter reverse the sign of precautionary effects on borrowi...

Friedman’s contribution to the consumption literature goes well beyond the seminal permanent-income hypothesis. He conjectured that the marginal propensity to consume out of financial wealth shall be larger than out of “human wealth,” the present discounted value of future labor income. I present an explicitly-solved model to deliver this widely-noted consumption property by specifying that the conditional variance of changes in income increases with its level. A larger realization of income not only implies a higher level of human wealth, but also signals a riskier stream of future labor income, inducing a higher precautionary saving, and thus giving rise to Friedman’s conjecture. Appropriately adjusting human wealth for income risk, I show that Friedman’s conjecture may be formulated as a “generalized” permanent income hypothesis. I further show that Friedman’s conjecture captures the first-order effect of stochastic precautionary savings. Finally, I propose a natural decomposition of the optimal saving rule to formalize various motives for holding wealth as emphasized in Friedman (1957).

We study the effects of risk and uncertainty on education and child labour in developing countries. Households that face more uncertainty, and with limited or no access to formal insurance, will have a higher motive for self-insurance and this may, under certain plausible conditions, have adverse consequences for child education. The model predictions are tested using Indonesian data. A negative effect of risk on education would constitute some evidence of children being used as insurance tools to smooth consumption. On the other hand, whilst a negligible effect of risk may indicate that formal insurance markets are well-functioning, it might also reflect the fact that households are using a wide range of other self-insurance mechanisms instead. A key contribution of the paper is to decompose risk into aggregate village I extend my sincere thanks and appreciation to Orazio Attanasio and Costas Meghir, my supervisors, for their help and guidance. I also thank Emanuela Galasso at the World Bank and Christine Peterson at RAND for help with the data. This work also benefitted

We study the effects of uncertainty on long-run growth in two model economies, where households fund risky investment projects of entrepreneurs in the presence of financial market imperfections. Imperfections in the first model are due to asymmetric information which is resolved through costly state verification. In this case, some entrepreneurs may decide at the outset not to borrow and not to run projects. Imperfections in the second model are due to incomplete enforceability of loan contracts. In this case, all entrepreneurs are willing to borrow, but some of them may choose not to run projects, preferring to abscond with their loans, instead. We show that, in both cases, an increase in uncertainty increases the rate of interest on loans which increases the number of entrepreneurs who abstain from running projects. This reduces capital accumulation and growth. We also show that financial market frictions have similar effects, and that the effects of uncertainty disappear when these frictions are absent. 1