American Economic Review
ISSN 0002-8282 (Print) | ISSN 1944-7981 (Online)
Productivity Losses from Financial Frictions: Can Self-Financing Undo Capital Misallocation?
American Economic Review
vol. 104,
no. 10, October 2014
(pp. 3186–3221)
Abstract
I develop a highly tractable general equilibrium model in which heterogeneous producers face collateral constraints, and study the effect of financial frictions on capital misallocation and aggregate productivity. My economy is isomorphic to a Solow model but with time-varying TFP. I argue that the persistence of idiosyncratic productivity shocks determines both the size of steady-state productivity losses and the speed of transitions: if shocks are persistent, steady-state losses are small but transitions are slow. Even if financial frictions are unimportant in the long run, they tend to matter in the short run and analyzing steady states only can be misleading.Citation
Moll, Benjamin. 2014. "Productivity Losses from Financial Frictions: Can Self-Financing Undo Capital Misallocation?" American Economic Review, 104 (10): 3186–3221. DOI: 10.1257/aer.104.10.3186Additional Materials
JEL Classification
- E21 Macroeconomics: Consumption; Saving; Wealth
- E22 Capital; Investment; Capacity
- E23 Macroeconomics: Production
- G32 Financing Policy; Financial Risk and Risk Management; Capital and Ownership Structure; Value of Firms; Goodwill
- L26 Entrepreneurship
- O16 Economic Development: Financial Markets; Saving and Capital Investment; Corporate Finance and Governance