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How do Individual UK Producer Prices Behave?

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  • Philip Bunn
  • Colin Ellis

Abstract

This paper examines the behaviour of individual producer prices in the United Kingdom, and uncovers a number of stylised facts about pricing behaviour. First, on average 26% of producer prices change each month, although there is considerable heterogeneity between sectors and price changes occur less frequently when measured by the average for individual products. Second, the probability of price changes is not constant over time: prices are most likely to change one, four and twelve months after they were previously set. Third, the distribution of price changes is wide, although a significant number of changes are relatively small and close to zero. Fourth, prices that change more frequently tend to do so by less. And fifth, price changes are much less persistent at the disaggregated level than aggregate inflation data imply. We find that conventional pricing theories struggle to match these results, particularly the marked heterogeneity.
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  • Philip Bunn & Colin Ellis, 2012. "How do Individual UK Producer Prices Behave?," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 122(558), pages 16-34, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:ecj:econjl:v:122:y:2012:i:558:p:f16-f34
    DOI: j.1468-0297.2011.02489.x
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    Cited by:

    1. Froyen, Richard T. & Guender, Alfred V., 2014. "Price level targeting and the delegation issue in an open economy," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 122(1), pages 12-15.
    2. Bunn, Philip & Ellis, Colin, 2011. "How do individual UK consumer prices behave?," Bank of England working papers 438, Bank of England.
    3. Alessandro Flamini & Guido Ascari & Lorenza Rossi, 2012. "Industrial Transformation, Heterogeneity in Price Stickiness, and the Great Moderation," DEM Working Papers Series 025, University of Pavia, Department of Economics and Management.
    4. Philip Bunn & Colin Ellis, 2012. "How do Individual UK Producer Prices Behave?," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 122(558), pages 16-34, February.
    5. David Staines, 2023. "Stochastic Equilibrium the Lucas Critique and Keynesian Economics," Papers 2312.16214, arXiv.org, revised Jun 2024.
    6. Richard T. Froyen & Alfred V. Guender, 2017. "What to Aim for? The Choice of an Inflation Objective when Openness Matters," Open Economies Review, Springer, vol. 28(1), pages 167-190, February.
    7. Richard T Froyen & Alfred V Guender, 2015. "Real-Exchange-Rate-Adjusted Inflation Targeting in an Open Economy: Some Analytical Results," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 35(4), pages 2049-2059.
    8. Huw Dixon & Kul Luintel & Kun Tian, 2020. "The Impact of the 2008 Crisis on UK Prices: What We Can Learn from the CPI Microdata," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 82(6), pages 1322-1341, December.
    9. Amlendu Dubey & Juhi Lohani, 2022. "Inflation targeting and price behaviour: evidence from India," Indian Economic Review, Springer, vol. 57(2), pages 265-284, December.
    10. Dixon Huw, 2012. "A Unified Framework for Using Micro-Data to Compare Dynamic Time-Dependent Price-Setting Models," The B.E. Journal of Macroeconomics, De Gruyter, vol. 12(1), pages 1-45, July.
    11. Zakaria Babutsidze, 2012. "Asymmetric (S,s) Pricing: Implications for Monetary Policy," Revue de l'OFCE, Presses de Sciences-Po, vol. 0(5), pages 177-204.
    12. Harimohan, Rashmi, 2012. "How has the risk to inflation from inflation expectations evolved?," Bank of England Quarterly Bulletin, Bank of England, vol. 52(2), pages 114-123.
    13. Chen, Haixia & Le, Vo Phuong Mai & Meenagh, David & Minford, Patrick, 2023. "UK Monetary Policy in An Estimated DSGE Model with State-Dependent Price and Wage Contracts," Cardiff Economics Working Papers E2023/22, Cardiff University, Cardiff Business School, Economics Section.
    14. Huw D. Dixon, 2010. "A Unified Framework for Using Micro-Data to Compare Dynamic Wage and Price Setting Models," CESifo Working Paper Series 3093, CESifo.
    15. Khan Hashmat & Tsoukalas John, 2013. "Effects of productivity shocks on hours worked: UK evidence," The B.E. Journal of Macroeconomics, De Gruyter, vol. 13(1), pages 549-579, September.
    16. Philip Bunn & Colin Ellis, 2012. "Examining The Behaviour Of Individual UK Consumer Prices," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 122(558), pages 35-55, February.
    17. Froyen, Richard T. & Guender, Alfred V., 2018. "The real exchange rate in Taylor rules: A Re-Assessment," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 73(C), pages 140-151.
    18. Millard, Stephen & O'Grady, Tom, 2012. "What do sticky and flexible prices tell us?," Bank of England working papers 457, Bank of England.

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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • D40 - Microeconomics - - Market Structure, Pricing, and Design - - - General
    • E31 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Price Level; Inflation; Deflation

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