Credit Market Imperfections Research Articles

Financial literacy and borrower discouragement

This study provides first empirical evidence on the impact of entrepreneurs’ financial literacy on borrower discouragement. Using novel survey data on Italian micro-enterprises, we find that less financially knowledgeable entrepreneurs are more likely to be discouraged from applying for new financing, especially due to higher application costs. Our results are robust to several sensitivity checks, including accounting for potential endogeneity. Furthermore, we show that the observed self-rationing mechanism is rather inefficient, suggesting that financial literacy might play a key role in reducing credit market imperfections.

Left and right: a tale of two tails of the wealth distribution

We study a model of wealth accumulation in altruistic lineages, in which households face uninsurable risk, investment indivisibilities and borrowing constraints. A thick upper tail of the stationary distribution of wealth is shown to emerge as a robust prediction, irrespective of (1) the presence of multidimensional (wealth and ability) heterogeneity and non-convexities in human capital formation, and (2) the nature of parental bequest motives (joy-of-giving vs. paternalism). Additionally, (3) we identify conditions under which the unique, ergodic wealth distribution exhibits a mass point at the bottom of its support, where credit market imperfections continue to affect, along the convergence process, the structure of wealth transitions at the lineage level. Motivated by these results, we then analyze the sensitivity of the left tail to various frictions and fiscal instruments that affect bequest strategies and the ensuing transmission of wealth across generations. In particular, capital income or bequest taxes with no redistribution may reinforce economic mechanisms underpinning mobility traps in the left tail, thereby increasing the persistence of households in the lowest tiers of the wealth distribution.

Unravelling the credit market shocks and investment dynamics: A theoretical and empirical perspective

This paper investigates the underlying credit market shocks that historically affected business investment in the Slovenian economy. In contrast to the existing literature, we explore more profound structural shocks beneath the credit demand and supply shocks. For the purpose of structural identification, we propose a theoretical model of the credit market that reveals the credit market imperfections on the side of credit supply as well as liquidity demand. The theoretical structure justifies our set of identifying restrictions, further evaluated with the structural Bayesian VAR model. Our results confirm the relevance of loan supply shocks for the business investment activity, suggesting the existence of credit market imperfections. Furthermore, business investment is strongly conditioned by liquidity demand shocks, which explain a significant part of the variation in investment activity. Even though loan supply shocks constrained the investment activity in Slovenia during the financial crisis, the results of our analysis suggest that banks predominantly reacted to the increasing financial risk as opposed to the changes in their profit functions. Based on the results, we may conclude that in the common monetary area, fiscal policy should implement country-specific measures to effectively address the business sector's expectations regarding the economy's medium- and long-term development.

Credit Market Imperfections, Urban Land Rents and the Henry George Theorem

Cet article étudie l’impact du marché du crédit sur les prix du foncier et ses implications en termes de politiques fiscales. Nous introduisons un coût à l’emprunt et une contrainte d’apport personnel dans le modèle standard d’économie urbaine. Ces imperfections s’avèrent réduire les prix de la terre dans les localisations les plus attractives. Cette baisse est d’autant plus forte que les terres sont rares et les villes peuplées et dotées d’infrastructures de transport inefficaces. La contrainte d’apport personnel peut générer des écarts d’utilités d’équilibre entre des ménages initialement homogènes. Le théorème d’Henry George, selon lequel une taxe confisquant les rentes foncières suffit à financer les biens publics, doit être amendé en présence de contraintes de crédit. Pour chaque type d’imperfections du marché du crédit, nous proposons un système de taxation optimale .

Sector Heterogeneity and Credit Market Imperfections in Emerging Markets <br>

Sector Heterogeneity and Credit Market Imperfections in Emerging Markets <br>

Structural changes in African households: Female-headed households and Children's educational investments in an imperfect credit market in Africa

Female headship of households has increased significantly around the world. This paper establishes a link between gender, income, and children's educational investments in an imperfect credit market. We show using a representative household survey from Ghana that, even though there is a positive correlation between income and educational investments, there are expected and unexpected heterogeneities in income and children's educational investments. We find that, whereas income levels for male-headed households with children 6 to 18 years are over 20% higher, female-headed households tend to invest 31% to 38% more on children's education than male-headed households. In imperfect credit markets, higher educational investments could be taking place at the expense of other household outcomes such as food/leisure. Our empirical results show the need for different interventions for different households. We also show how institutional changes that recognize affirmative action can interact with household-level structural changes.

Rational housing demand bubble

We provide a unified framework with demand for housing over the life cycle and financial frictions to analyze the existence and macroeconomic effects of rational housing bubbles. We distinguish a housing price bubble, defined as the difference between the housing market price and its fundamental value, from a housing demand bubble, which corresponds to a situation where a pure speculative housing demand exists. In an overlapping generation exchange economy, we show that no housing price bubble occurs. However, a housing demand bubble may occur, generating a boom in housing prices and a drop in the interest rate, when households face a binding borrowing constraint. The multiplicity of steady states and endogenous fluctuations can occur when credit market imperfections are moderate. These fluctuations involve transitions between equilibria with and without a housing demand bubble that generate large fluctuations in housing prices consistent with observed patterns. We finally extend the basic framework to a production economy and we show that a housing demand bubble increases housing prices, which can still be characterized by large fluctuations.

Credit market imperfection, lack of entrepreneurship and capital outflow from a developing economy

AbstractThis paper explores the impact of credit market imperfection on lack of demand for capital, trade, and capital flows in an economy with wealth heterogeneity. In particular, we look at the implications of wealth heterogeneity. We show that the low return of capital and lower output of credit‐intensive output in autarky may reflect lack of entrepreneurship and demand for credit due to wealth heterogeneity and eventually may lead to capital outflow from a capital‐scarce country. This is a different way of echoing the sentiment of the well–known Lucas paradox, which suggests that capital might flow from the poor to the rich countries. We also show the possibility of trade and capital flow being complements and not substitutes, as is usual in standard trade models driven by factor abundance.

Economic Growth and Income Inequality Relationship: Role of Credit Market Imperfection

The 20th century has witnessed unequalled success in improving the living standard of people in most part of the world. According to World Bank annual Statistical reports, poverty has declined significantly in developing countries over the past twenty years but the progress has been uneven. The number of people living in poverty fell from 1.5 billion in 1981 to 1.1 billion in 2001. However, many low-income developing countries are still trapped in vicious circle of poverty. In Sub-Saharan Africa, the number of poor rose from 41 percent to 46 percent between 1981 to 2001.While in Eastern Europe and Central Asia, the numbers of poor people have risen to around 20 percent in 2001.1 Therefore; reduction of widely scattered poverty is the most challenging goal for low income developing countries. Economic growth is considered to be a powerful force for reducing poverty. High and sustained economic growth increases the labor demand and wages which in return will reduce poverty. Similarly, better earnings as a result of reduction in poverty lead to increase productivity and growth. But the extent of poverty reduction as a result of economic growth depends on how the distribution of income changes with economic growth and on initial Inequalities in income. If income inequality increases, then economic growth does not lead to a significant poverty reduction. Many developing countries achieved high growth rates in different periods but poverty does not reduce significantly in these periods due to increase in income inequalities. Most South and East Asian economies grew at higher per capita rates since early 1970 along with rise in income inequality over time. In contrast, Latin American countries grew by less than the half of average growth rates in South and East Asia while maintaining high income inequality.2 The differences in income inequality at a given rate of growth require that efforts to reduce poverty by stimulating growth are not sufficient and need to be complemented by efforts to reduce income inequalities.

Effects of volatility, fiscal policy cyclicality, and financial development on growth in South Asia

This study empirically investigates the association between macroeconomic volatility and growth in the presence of credit constraints and governmental fiscal policy stance. This study considers four South Asian countries: Bangladesh, India, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka to examine the relationship between macroeconomic volatility and growth during the period lasting from 1980 to 2018 using the fully modified least square method. This study finds an inverse impact of volatility on growth in the presence of financial market constraints as credit market imperfections restrict companies from borrowing which eventually affect long-term investment and innovations. Also, the results suggest that fiscal policy for South Asian countries is pro-cyclical.

Growrth and Distribution of Agrarian Assets in the Punjab

This is a micro study of the growth and distribution of the non-land agrarian assets in the Punjab between 1970 and 1984. This period of farm accumulation is interesting especially since it allows us to trace the agricultllral productivity impact of the Green Revolution (introduced in the late 1960's) on the distribution of wealth. The Green Revolution was based on a wide spread adoption of inputs, HYV seed, and fertiliser, albeit with some evidence of time lags and differentials across farm size, and it generated a high rate of acquisition of agrarian assets, especially tubewells and mechanisation. The introduction of the HYV inputs definitely enhanced profitability, income, and wealth in the farm sector, but its impact on the distribution of agrarian assets across income classes was not so definite. This study focuses on this less well-researched aspect of the distribution of wealth generated by the Green Revolution. To examine asset accumulation. we posit an analytical framework of exogenous and endogenous constraints on growth, which is useful in picking up both the common and contrasting patterns of growth and distribution across the two distinct regions of the Punjab. the canal colonies. and southern Punjab. The first exogenous constraint of an imperfect credit market is macro in nature. and is common to both regions. which strongly handicaps asset acquisition by small farmers. Further. there is evidence that, given the new technology. the ownership of assets is an important determinant of both growth and distribution. So this initial equity bias against small farmers in the first round of accumulation implies an even greater bias in the second round. The second endogenous constraint is regionally specific to the more land-concentrated southern region. which generates supervision costs for the largest operators. preventing them from expanding their operated area further through increased mechanisation. It also adds to the persistence in southern Punjab of the contractual form of sharecropping, in contrast to the proliferation of self-cultivation and use of wage-labour in the canal colonies.

Credit market imperfection and goods market deregulation in OLG model

AbstractWe study the effects of financial development and product market competition on the macroeconomic dynamics in an overlapping generations model with credit market imperfections and monopolistic competition. In general, financial development is regarded as one of the key engines for economic growth. Financial market deregulation facilitates financing for entrepreneurs and has a positive effect on business growth. In fact, the effects of financial liberalization are different between developing and developed countries. We develop a model in which financial development brings about the regime shift endogenously. We show that financial liberalization at an early stage of economic development is harmful for economic growth. Instead, financial liberalization should be conducted after the take‐off of the economy. The sequence of carrying out several market deregulation policies is important. We insist that the government should deregulate the goods market before financial market liberalization.

The macroeconomics of a pandemic: A minimalist framework*

To analyze the macroeconomics of a pandemic we build a minimalist framework with two essential components. The first is productivity-related: if the virus forces firms to shed labor beyond a certain threshold, productivity suffers. The second component is a credit market imperfection: because lenders cannot be sure a borrower will repay, they only lend against collateral. Expected productivity determines collateral value; in turn, collateral value can limit borrowing and productivity. As a result, adverse shocks have large magnification effects, in an unemployment and asset price deflation doom loop. There may be multiple equilibria, so that pessimistic expectations can push the economy to a bad equilibrium with limited borrowing and low employment and productivity. The model helps identify policies to fight the effects of the pandemic. Traditional expansionary fiscal policy has no beneficial effects, while cutting interest rates has a limited effect if the initial real interest rate is low. By contrast, several unconventional policies, including wage subsidies, helicopter drops of liquid assets, equity injections, and loan guarantees, can keep the economy in a high-employment, high-productivity equilibrium. Such policies can be fiscally expensive, so they are feasible only with ample fiscal space or emergency financing from abroad. Preliminary macroeconomic evidence is consistent with the mechanisms in our model.

Financial Market Globalization, Deglobalization Policies and Growth

This paper develops a world economy growth model to explore the consequences of financial market globalization. The model consists of small open countries that are plagued by domestic credit market imperfection and are connected via knowledge spillovers. When knowledge diffuses from the technology leader to the world as an international public good, the model predicts that financial market globalization promotes growth despite uphill credit flows dividing the world economy into a high‐income core and a low‐income periphery. But the associated world growth rate is not optimal. Barriers to cross‐border credit flows can give rise to a higher worldwide rate of growth through which all countries can benefit.

Tax enforcement and corporate employment: Evidence from a quasi-natural experiment in China

This study investigates how tax enforcement affects corporate employment in China. We utilize the merger of the State Tax Bureau and Local Tax Bureaus as a quasi-natural experiment and adopt a difference-in-differences framework to identify causality. The results show that tougher tax enforcement has a significant and negative effect on corporate employment and that this effect is more pronounced for firms with higher labor intensity, greater financial constraints, more severe labor market frictions, a lower initial tax rate, lower tax transfer ability, and greater credit market imperfections. Further, the mechanism tests demonstrate that tougher tax enforcement leads to increases in the effective income tax rate, cash holdings, and the cash flow sensitivity of real investment but decreases in accounts receivable and dividend payments. These results are consistent with the liquidity constraints channel. In addition, we exclude several alternative explanations and conduct a series of robustness checks. Overall, our findings indicate that corporate tax enforcement has large effects on the local labor demand, which provides some useful insights for local governments to stabilize employment during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Climate Policy and Wealth Distribution

We set up a model with intergenerational bequest transfers and climate damage on the wealth of heterogeneous households. We show that, under credit market imperfections and depending on wealth distribution across households, a balanced budget climate policy may widen the wealth inequality gap between the rich and poor. Climate policy may create positive effects on the wealth of households, but these effects are asymmetric across households in terms of both magnitude and the transmission of gains from a climate policy within households. The gains of the poor from a climate policy are mainly transmitted into improving living standards and the investment in human capital due to the higher marginal return to education investment. By contrast, the gains of the rich from a climate policy are transmitted biasedly into physical capital accumulation and thereby enhance their monopolistic position in the production of intermediate inputs. We show that, for any climate policy, there exists a corresponding threshold of aggregate physical capital. When the aggregate physical capital of the economy exceeds this threshold, the corresponding climate policy may widen the intergenerational bequest transfers among heterogeneous households, thereby contributing to widening the wealth inequality gap between the rich and poor.

COVID-19, nonperforming loans, and cross-border bank lending

A severe economic downturn brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic, combined with high debt levels globally, raises the specter of mounting nonperforming loans (NPLs) in global banking systems. This paper investigates the impact of higher NPL ratios on the availability of bank credit among international lenders and emerging market borrowers. The paper finds that a rise in NPL ratios in both lender and borrower countries is positively associated with higher banking outflows from emerging market economies. Two additional features emerge in the patterns of cross-border banking flows when NPL ratios rise that are related to international credit market imperfections. First, lenders are more responsive to a rise in NPL ratios of same-region borrowers. This is consistent with the “reversion to the mean’’ effect given their generally high exposures to the same-region borrowers. Second, while a high share of US-dollar-denominated debt is generally positively associated with withdrawals of funds from emerging market borrowers, lenders are less responsive to a rise in NPL ratios in emerging market economies if their liabilities are denominated more in US dollars. The results are in line with the “original sin redux” hypothesis.

Competition, asset build up and export incentives: The role of imperfect credit market

This paper studies the export incentive of credit rationed, competitive and homogenous firms through asset build up highlighting the generic trade-off between competition and asset value in an imperfect credit market where poor and rich firms have different levels of assets. It is a contribution to the issues related to finance and trade in developing countries as raised first in Jones and Marjit (2001, AER). Our theoretical and empirical results indicate that although firms in more competitive industries are likely to be exporters, history of greater local competition before the entry of firms into export market i.e. under autarky, hurts export incentive by limiting cash flows and asset build up. In our set up more intense local competition hence lower price is an advantage to access global markets, but associated low profits and hence lower assets acts a detriment.

The Young, the Old, and the Government: Demographics and Fiscal Multipliers

We document that government spending multipliers depend on the population age structure. Using the variation in military spending and birth rates across US states, we show that the local fiscal multiplier is 1.5 and increases with the population share of young people, implying multipliers of 1.1–1.9 in the interquartile range. A parsimonious life cycle open economy New Keynesian model with credit market imperfections and age-specific differences in labor supply and demand explains 87 percent of the relationship between local multipliers and demographics. The model implies that the US population aging between 1980 and 2015 caused a 38 percent drop in national government spending multipliers. (JEL D15, E12, E24, E62, J11, J22, J23)

The new Ricardian specific factor model

This paper explores the implications on trade and wage inequality of introducing financial capital or credit in the standard Ricardian model of production, where a given amount of start-up credit is used to employ sector specific skilled and unskilled workers following the Wage Fund approach of classical economists. Thus, we have the Specific Factor (SF) structure of Jones (1971) in a new Ricardian model (NRM) with credit and two types of labour. With an entirely different mechanism from the conventional Neo-Classical structure, distributional consequences of changes in endowments, commodity prices, and financial capital are established. Comparisons with Jones (1971) show that unlike SF model, credit expansion affects wages and nominal costs without affecting trade patterns, while rise in the relative price of the skill-intensive good causes skilled wage to hike less than proportionately, and may cause return to capital to inflate more than the wages. We extend the basic model to analyse immigration, unemployment and imperfect credit market.