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Estimating the Natural Rate of Unemployment and Testing the Natural Rate Hypothesis

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  • Salemi, Michael K

Abstract

How should one measure the natural rate of unemployment? This paper proposes a systems procedure as an alternative to NAIRU. The natural rate is treated as an unobserved state variable in a system that includes measurement equations for the unemployment rate, the rate of wage growth and the rate of inflation. The model is derived from a version of the wage bargaining model of Blanchard and embodies a version of the natural rate hypothesis. The model is estimated by embedding the Kalman filter within the full-information maximum likelihood procedure. For US data, the estimated model implies substantial post-war variation in the natural rate and a negative, but weak, effect of inflation surprises on unemployment.

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  • Salemi, Michael K, 1999. "Estimating the Natural Rate of Unemployment and Testing the Natural Rate Hypothesis," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 14(1), pages 1-25, Jan.-Feb..
    • Handle: RePEc:jae:japmet:v:14:y:1999:i:1:p:1-25
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    2. Emilio Congregado & Antonio Golpe & Simon Parker, 2012. "The dynamics of entrepreneurship: hysteresis, business cycles and government policy," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 43(3), pages 1239-1261, December.
    3. Aysun, Uluc & Bouvet, Florence & Hofler, Richard, 2014. "An alternative measure of structural unemployment," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 38(C), pages 592-603.
    4. King, Thomas B. & Morley, James, 2007. "In search of the natural rate of unemployment," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 54(2), pages 550-564, March.
    5. Ángel L. Martín‐Román & Jaime Cuéllar‐Martín & Alfonso Moral, 2023. "Natural and cyclical unemployment: A stochastic frontier decomposition and economic policy implications," Bulletin of Economic Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 75(1), pages 5-39, January.
    6. Arabinda Basistha & Richard Startz, 2004. "Measuring the NAIRU with Reduced Uncertainty: A Multiple Indicator-Common Component Approach," Working Papers UWEC-2004-22, University of Washington, Department of Economics.
    7. Tara M. Sinclair, 2009. "The Relationships between Permanent and Transitory Movements in U.S. Output and the Unemployment Rate," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 41(2-3), pages 529-542, March.
    8. Rodríguez, Gabriel, 2010. "Using A Forward-Looking Phillips Curve to Estimate the Output Gap in Peru," Review of Applied Economics, Lincoln University, Department of Financial and Business Systems, vol. 6(01-2), pages 1-13, April.
    9. Lindblad, Hans & Sellin, Peter, 2003. "The Equilibrium Rate of Unemployment and the Real Exchange Rate: An Unobserved Components System Approach," Working Paper Series 152, Sveriges Riksbank (Central Bank of Sweden).
    10. Chiarini, Bruno & Piselli, Paolo, 2001. "Identification and dimension of the NAIRU," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 18(4), pages 585-611, December.
    11. Congregado, Emilio & Golpe, Antonio A. & Carmona, Mónica, 2012. "Looking for hysteresis in coal consumption in the US," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 16(5), pages 3339-3343.
    12. James Morley & Tara M. Sinclair, 2005. "Testing for Stationarity and Cointegration in an Unobserved Components Framework," Computing in Economics and Finance 2005 451, Society for Computational Economics.
    13. Golpe, Antonio A. & Carmona, Monica & Congregado, Emilio, 2012. "Persistence in natural gas consumption in the US: An unobserved component model," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 594-600.
    14. Michael K. Salemi, 2007. "Long-run and Cyclic Movements in the Unemployment Rate in Hong Kong: A Dynamic, General Equilibrium Approach," Working Papers 192007, Hong Kong Institute for Monetary Research.
    15. T. Berger & G. Everaert, 2006. "Re-examining the Structural and the Persistence Approach to Unemployment," Working Papers of Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, Ghent University, Belgium 06/383, Ghent University, Faculty of Economics and Business Administration.
    16. Basistha, Arabinda & Nelson, Charles R., 2007. "New measures of the output gap based on the forward-looking new Keynesian Phillips curve," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 54(2), pages 498-511, March.
    17. Findley, T. Scott, 2015. "Hyperbolic memory discounting and the political business cycle," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 40(PB), pages 345-359.

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