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Jobless Recoveries During Financial Crises: Is Inflation the Way Out?

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  • Guillermo Calvo
  • Fabrizio Coricelli
  • Pablo Ottonello

Abstract

This paper discusses three policy tools to mitigate jobless recoveries during financial crises: inflation, real currency depreciation, and credit-recovery policies. Using a sample of financial crises in Emerging Market economies, we document that large inflationary spikes appear to help unemployment to get back to pre-crisis levels. However, the counterpart of inflation is sizably lower real wages. Hence, inflation does not prevent wage earners as a whole from getting hit by financial crises. Interestingly, neither the change in the real exchange rate nor the change in output composition (tradables/nontradables), from output peak to recovery point, displays a statistically significant relationship with inflation or jobless recovery. This suggests that currency depreciation can help reduce unemployment only insofar as it is associated with inflation, and that jobless recovery is likely due to nominal wage rigidity. The paper also shows that measures to reactivate credit flows could be beneficial to wage earners as a whole, as measured by the real wage bill.

Suggested Citation

  • Guillermo Calvo & Fabrizio Coricelli & Pablo Ottonello, 2013. "Jobless Recoveries During Financial Crises: Is Inflation the Way Out?," NBER Working Papers 19683, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:19683
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    Cited by:

    1. Guillermo A. Calvo, 2016. "From Chronic Inflation to Chronic Deflation: Focusing on Expectations and Liquidity Disarray Since WWII," NBER Working Papers 22535, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Mingjin Luo & Shenqguan Wang, 2023. "Financialization and sluggish recovery of firms' investment: Global evidence from the 2007–2008 financial crisis," International Finance, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 26(3), pages 344-363, December.
    3. Javier Bianchi & Enrique Mendoza, 2020. "A Fisherian Approach to Financial Crises: Lessons from the Sudden Stops Literature," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 37, pages 254-283, August.
    4. Bradley Michael D. & Jansen Dennis W., 2018. "Nonlinear evidence on the existence of jobless recoveries," Studies in Nonlinear Dynamics & Econometrics, De Gruyter, vol. 22(1), pages 1-19, February.
    5. Finkelstein Shapiro, Alan, 2014. "Self-employment and business cycle persistence: Does the composition of employment matter for economic recoveries?," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 200-218.
    6. Popov, Alexander & Rocholl, Jörg, 2015. "Financing constraints, employment, and labor compensation: evidence from the subprime mortgage crisis," Working Paper Series 1821, European Central Bank.
    7. Òscar Jordà & Moritz Schularick & Alan M. Taylor, 2024. "Disasters Everywhere: The Costs of Business Cycles Reconsidered," IMF Economic Review, Palgrave Macmillan;International Monetary Fund, vol. 72(1), pages 116-151, March.
    8. Antonio M. Conti & Elisa Guglielminetti & Marianna Riggi, 2019. "Labour productivity and the wageless recovery," Temi di discussione (Economic working papers) 1257, Bank of Italy, Economic Research and International Relations Area.
    9. Popov, Alexander & Rocholl, Jörg, 2018. "Do credit shocks affect labor demand? Evidence for employment and wages during the financial crisis," Journal of Financial Intermediation, Elsevier, vol. 36(C), pages 16-27.
    10. Jin, Yuying & Luo, Mingjin & Wan, Chao, 2018. "Financial constraints, macro-financing environment and post-crisis recovery of firms," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 55(C), pages 54-67.
    11. Guillermo A. Calvo, 2013. "The Mayekawa Lecture: Puzzling over the Anatomy of Crises- Liquidity and the Veil of Finance," Monetary and Economic Studies, Institute for Monetary and Economic Studies, Bank of Japan, vol. 31, pages 39-64, November.
    12. Grant, Angelia L., 2018. "The Great Recession and Okun's law," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 69(C), pages 291-300.

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    JEL classification:

    • E44 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Money and Interest Rates - - - Financial Markets and the Macroeconomy
    • E52 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit - - - Monetary Policy

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