Consumption Smoothing and the Current Account : Evidence for France, 1970-1994 /

This paper estimates a simple consumption-smoothing model of the French current account, and examines its capacity to predict recent developments in France's external performance. The model views the current account as a buffer through which private agents can smooth consumption over time in re...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Bismut, Claude
Other Authors: Agenor, Pierre-Richard, Cashin, Paul, McDermott, C.
Format: Journal
Language:English
Published: Washington, D.C. : International Monetary Fund, 1995.
Series:IMF Working Papers; Working Paper ; No. 1995/119
Online Access:Full text available on IMF
Description
Summary:This paper estimates a simple consumption-smoothing model of the French current account, and examines its capacity to predict recent developments in France's external performance. The model views the current account as a buffer through which private agents can smooth consumption over time in response to temporary disturbances to output, investment, and government expenditure. The empirical results indicate that the model performs well overall, and predicts correctly the sharp turnaround in France's external accounts observed in the past three years-a feature of the data that conventional models of trade flows, based on income and relative price variables, appear unable to explain.
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Physical Description:1 online resource (18 pages)
Format:Mode of access: Internet
ISSN:1018-5941
Access:Electronic access restricted to authorized BRAC University faculty, staff and students