IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/pra/mprapa/45391.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

How to Turn a Recession into a Depression: The Role of the Media, of the Politicians, and of the Political Analysts

Author

Listed:
  • Hatzinikolaou, Dimitris

Abstract

By modifying slightly a standard neoclassical-synthesis macroeconomic model, this paper investigates the effects of an adverse supply or demand shock on output, employment, investment, prices, interest rates, and the exchange rate. The paper focuses on the possibility of the magnification of these effects by the media, the politicians, and the political analysts, who induce herd-behavior by overstating the size of the shock. I find that such behavior destabilizes the economy by magnifying the amplitude of the business cycle and by hurting private investment, which might cause expansions to be shorter and contractions to last longer.

Suggested Citation

  • Hatzinikolaou, Dimitris, 2010. "How to Turn a Recession into a Depression: The Role of the Media, of the Politicians, and of the Political Analysts," MPRA Paper 45391, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 15 Sep 2010.
    • Handle: RePEc:pra:mprapa:45391
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/45391/1/MPRA_paper_45391.pdf
    File Function: original version
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Castro, Vítor, 2010. "The duration of economic expansions and recessions: More than duration dependence," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 32(1), pages 347-365, March.
    2. Sendhil Mullainathan & Andrei Shleifer, 2002. "Media Bias," NBER Working Papers 9295, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Erica L. Groshen & Simon M. Potter, 2003. "Has structural change contributed to a jobless recovery?," Current Issues in Economics and Finance, Federal Reserve Bank of New York, vol. 9(Aug).
    4. Karel Jan Alsem & Steven Brakman & Lex Hoogduin & Gerard Kuper, 2008. "The impact of newspapers on consumer confidence: does spin bias exist?," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 40(5), pages 531-539.
    5. Evans, George W. & Ramey, Garey, 2006. "Adaptive expectations, underparameterization and the Lucas critique," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 53(2), pages 249-264, March.
    6. Shiller, Robert J, 1995. "Conversation, Information, and Herd Behavior," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 85(2), pages 181-185, May.
    7. Sendhil Mullainathan & Andrei Shleifer, 2005. "The Market for News," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(4), pages 1031-1053, September.
    8. Conlisk, John, 1996. "Bounded rationality and market fluctuations," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 29(2), pages 233-250, March.
    9. John Conlisk, 1996. "Why Bounded Rationality?," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 34(2), pages 669-700, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Chan, Jimmy & Suen, Wing, 2009. "Media as watchdogs: The role of news media in electoral competition," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 53(7), pages 799-814, October.
    2. Sendhil Mullainathan & Joshua Schwartzstein & Andrei Shleifer, 2008. "Coarse Thinking and Persuasion," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 123(2), pages 577-619.
    3. Mastrogiorgio, Antonio & Petracca, Enrico, 2016. "Embodying rationality," MPRA Paper 74658, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    4. Corneo, Giacomo, 2006. "Media capture in a democracy: The role of wealth concentration," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 90(1-2), pages 37-58, January.
    5. Ardalan, Kavous, 2018. "Neurofinance versus the efficient markets hypothesis," Global Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 35(C), pages 170-176.
    6. Devarajan, Shantayanan & Khemani, Stuti & Walton, Michael, 2011. "Civil Society, Public Action and Accountability in Africa," Working Paper Series rwp11-036, Harvard University, John F. Kennedy School of Government.
    7. Arnoud W.A. Boot & Anjan V. Thakor, 2003. "Disagreement and Flexibility: A Theory of Optimal Security Issuance and Capital Structure," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 03-001/2, Tinbergen Institute.
    8. Hirshleifer, David & Teoh, Siew Hong, 2008. "Thought and Behavior Contagion in Capital Markets," MPRA Paper 9164, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    9. Daniel Sutter, 2006. "Media scrutiny and the quality of public officials," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 129(1), pages 25-40, October.
    10. Blanka Škrabić Perić & Petar Sorić, 2018. "A Note on the “Economic Policy Uncertainty Index”," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 137(2), pages 505-526, June.
    11. Karel Jan Alsem & Steven Brakman & Lex Hoogduin & Gerard Kuper, 2008. "The impact of newspapers on consumer confidence: does spin bias exist?," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 40(5), pages 531-539.
    12. Park, Mi Sun & Kleinschmit, Daniela, 2016. "Framing forest conservation in the global media: An interest-based approach," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 68(C), pages 7-15.
    13. Karel Jan Alsem & Steven Brakman & Lex Hoogduin & Gerard Kuper, 2008. "The impact of newspapers on consumer confidence: does spin bias exist?," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 40(5), pages 531-539.
    14. Vilella-Vila, Marta & Costa-Font, Joan, 2008. "Press media reporting effects on risk perceptions and attitudes towards genetically modified (GM) food," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 37(5), pages 2095-2106, October.
    15. Alan S. Blinder & Michael Ehrmann & Jakob de Haan & David-Jan Jansen, 2024. "Central Bank Communication with the General Public: Promise or False Hope?," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 62(2), pages 425-457, June.
    16. Yew-Kwang Ng & Xiaokai Yang, 2005. "Specialization, Information, And Growth: A Sequential Equilibrium Analysis," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: An Inframarginal Approach To Trade Theory, chapter 20, pages 447-474, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    17. Bernhardt, Lea & Dewenter, Ralf & Thomas, Tobias, 2023. "Measuring partisan media bias in US newscasts from 2001 to 2012," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 78(C).
    18. Tommaso Colussi & Ingo E. Isphording & Nico Pestel, 2021. "Minority Salience and Political Extremism," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 13(3), pages 237-271, July.
    19. Todd D. Gerarden & Richard G. Newell & Robert N. Stavins, 2017. "Assessing the Energy-Efficiency Gap," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 55(4), pages 1486-1525, December.
    20. Matteo Richiardi, 2003. "The Promises and Perils of Agent-Based Computational Economics," LABORatorio R. Revelli Working Papers Series 29, LABORatorio R. Revelli, Centre for Employment Studies.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Media; Newsmakers; Spin; Business Cycle; Herd Behavior; Neoclassical Synthesis;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • E02 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - General - - - Institutions and the Macroeconomy
    • E32 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Business Fluctuations; Cycles

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:pra:mprapa:45391. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Joachim Winter (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/vfmunde.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.