Price rigidity in China: Empirical results at home and abroad

Abstract

This paper explores the price rigidity in China using 259 monthly domestic and foreign macroeconomic time series. A factor-augmented vector autoregressive (FAVAR) model expanded with global components is employed. Three findings are obtained. First, the model shows that common components at home and abroad are the main driving force of price volatility; for price persistence, however, it is the global components that play a major role. Second, there is no clear evidence to show that the price stickiness in China is subject to urban-rural disparities. Last, we observe a relatively active price volatility and high persistence after the 2008 financial crisis, in which domestic components have increasingly significant impacts.