[go: up one dir, main page]

IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/dyncon/v130y2021ics016518892100124x.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Flight to housing in China

Author

Listed:
  • Dong, Feng
  • Liu, Jianfeng
  • Xu, Zhiwei
  • Zhao, Bo
Abstract
We empirically detect the flight to safety vis-a-vis housing in China: Great economic uncertainty causes the prices of housing assets to soar. To stabilize housing prices, China has imposed purchase restrictions on the housing market. We study the aggregate and distributional effects of this housing policy by developing a two-sector model with heterogeneous households. An uncertainty shock generates a countercyclical housing boom by shifting outward households’ demand for housing as a store of value. A vibrant housing sector then leads to an economic recession by crowding out resources that could have been allocated to the real sector. Our quantitative analysis suggests that the policy limiting housing purchases effectively curb surging housing prices. However, the policy restricts households’ access to housing that can be used to buffer idiosyncratic uncertainties, creating a larger consumption dispersion. Consequently, the housing policy creates a trade-off between macro-level stability and micro-level consumption risk sharing.

Suggested Citation

  • Dong, Feng & Liu, Jianfeng & Xu, Zhiwei & Zhao, Bo, 2021. "Flight to housing in China," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 130(C).
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:dyncon:v:130:y:2021:i:c:s016518892100124x
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jedc.2021.104189
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S016518892100124X
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.jedc.2021.104189?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Zhao, Bo, 2013. "Cyclical dynamics in idiosyncratic labor-market risks: Evidence from March CPS 1968–2011," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 120(3), pages 528-531.
    2. Paul Gomme & B. Ravikumar & Peter Rupert, 2011. "The Return to Capital and the Business Cycle," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 14(2), pages 262-278, April.
    3. Hanming Fang & Quanlin Gu & Wei Xiong & Li-An Zhou, 2016. "Demystifying the Chinese Housing Boom," NBER Macroeconomics Annual, University of Chicago Press, vol. 30(1), pages 105-166.
    4. Morris A. Davis, 2010. "housing and the business cycle," The New Palgrave Dictionary of Economics,, Palgrave Macmillan.
    5. Matteo Iacoviello, 2005. "House Prices, Borrowing Constraints, and Monetary Policy in the Business Cycle," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(3), pages 739-764, June.
    6. Jess Benhabib & Alberto Bisin & Shenghao Zhu, 2011. "The Distribution of Wealth and Fiscal Policy in Economies With Finitely Lived Agents," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 79(1), pages 123-157, January.
    7. Ricardo Lagos & Randall Wright, 2005. "A Unified Framework for Monetary Theory and Policy Analysis," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 113(3), pages 463-484, June.
    8. Kaiji Chen & Yi Wen, 2017. "The Great Housing Boom of China," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 9(2), pages 73-114, April.
    9. Ricardo J Caballero & Emmanuel Farhi, 2018. "The Safety Trap," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 85(1), pages 223-274.
    10. Ricardo J. Caballero & Emmanuel Farhi & Pierre-Olivier Gourinchas, 2016. "Safe Asset Scarcity and Aggregate Demand," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 106(5), pages 513-518, May.
    11. Bo Zhao, 2015. "Rational housing bubble," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 60(1), pages 141-201, September.
    12. Raül Santaeulàlia-Llopis & Yu Zheng, 2018. "The Price of Growth: Consumption Insurance in China 1989–2009," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 10(4), pages 1-35, October.
    13. Zhiguo He & Arvind Krishnamurthy & Konstantin Milbradt, 2019. "A Model of Safe Asset Determination," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 109(4), pages 1230-1262, April.
    14. Bing Han & Lu Han & Guozhong Zhu, 2018. "Housing Price And Fundamentals In A Transition Economy: The Case Of The Beijing Market," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 59(3), pages 1653-1677, August.
    15. Scott R. Baker & Nicholas Bloom & Steven J. Davis, 2016. "Measuring Economic Policy Uncertainty," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 131(4), pages 1593-1636.
    16. Zheng Liu & Pengfei Wang & Tao Zha, 2013. "Land‐Price Dynamics and Macroeconomic Fluctuations," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 81(3), pages 1147-1184, May.
    17. Matteo Iacoviello & Stefano Neri, 2010. "Housing Market Spillovers: Evidence from an Estimated DSGE Model," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 2(2), pages 125-164, April.
    18. Russell Cooper & Guozhong Zhu, 2017. "Household Finance in China," NBER Working Papers 23741, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    19. Richard Blundell & Luigi Pistaferri & Ian Preston, 2008. "Consumption Inequality and Partial Insurance," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 98(5), pages 1887-1921, December.
    20. Jianjun Miao & Pengfei Wang, 2018. "Asset Bubbles and Credit Constraints," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 108(9), pages 2590-2628, September.
    21. Gorton, Gary & Ordoñez, Guillermo, 2022. "The supply and demand for safe assets," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 125(C), pages 132-147.
    22. Zheng Song & Kjetil Storesletten & Fabrizio Zilibotti, 2011. "Growing Like China," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(1), pages 196-233, February.
    23. Quadrini, Vincenzo, 2017. "Bank liabilities channel," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 89(C), pages 25-44.
    24. Kjetil Storesletten & Chris I. Telmer & Amir Yaron, 2004. "Cyclical Dynamics in Idiosyncratic Labor Market Risk," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 112(3), pages 695-717, June.
    25. Wen, Yi, 2015. "Money, liquidity and welfare," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 76(C), pages 1-24.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Luo, Yuwei & Mei, Dongzhou, 2023. "The shortage of safe assets and China's housing boom," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 119(C).
    2. Dong, Feng & Xu, Zhiwei, 2022. "Bubbly bailout," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 202(C).
    3. Yin Germaschewski, 2023. "House price volatility in China: Demand versus supply," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 61(1), pages 199-220, January.
    4. Dong, Feng & Jia, Yandong & Wang, Siqing, 2022. "Speculative Bubbles and Talent Misallocation," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 141(C).
    5. Liu, Ding & Sun, Weihong & Xu, Liao & Zhang, Xuan, 2023. "Time-frequency relationship between economic policy uncertainty and financial cycle in China: Evidence from wavelet analysis," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 77(C).

    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. Shenzhe Jiang & Jianjun Miao & Yuzhe Zhang, 2019. "China’s Housing Bubble, Infrastructure Investment, and Economic Growth," Boston University - Department of Economics - Working Papers Series WP2020-005, Boston University - Department of Economics.
    2. Shenzhe Jiang & Jianjun Miao & Yuzhe Zhang, 2022. "China'S Housing Bubble, Infrastructure Investment, And Economic Growth," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 63(3), pages 1189-1237, August.
    3. Minetti, Raoul & Peng, Tao & Jiang, Tao, 2019. "Keeping up with the Zhangs and house price dynamics in China," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 109(C).
    4. Marx, Magali & Mojon, Benoît & Velde, François R., 2021. "Why have interest rates fallen far below the return on capital?," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 124(S), pages 57-76.
    5. Jaevin Park, 2020. "Inside Money, Business Cycle, and Bank Capital Requirements," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 36, pages 103-121, April.
    6. Stijn Claessens & M Ayhan Kose, 2018. "Frontiers of macrofinancial linkages," BIS Papers, Bank for International Settlements, number 95.
    7. Ran, Gao & Zixiang, Zhu & Jianhao, Lin, 2022. "Consumption–investment comovement and the dynamic impact of monetary policy uncertainty in China," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 113(C).
    8. Kydland, Finn & Rupert, Peter & Sustek, Roman, 2012. "Housing Dynamics over the Business Cycle," University of California at Santa Barbara, Economics Working Paper Series qt7bn5k73m, Department of Economics, UC Santa Barbara.
    9. Guo, Zi-Yi, 2017. "Information heterogeneity, housing dynamics and the business cycle," EconStor Preprints 168561, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.
    10. Marcus Moelbak Ingholt, 2017. "House Prices, Geographical Mobility, and Unemployment," Discussion Papers 17-06, University of Copenhagen. Department of Economics.
    11. Pedro Gete, 2015. "Housing demands, savings gluts and current account dynamics," Globalization Institute Working Papers 221, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.
    12. Lambertini, Luisa & Mendicino, Caterina & Punzi, Maria Teresa, 2017. "Expectations-driven cycles in the housing market," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 60(C), pages 297-312.
    13. Carlos Garriga & Finn E. Kydland & Roman Šustek, 2017. "Mortgages and Monetary Policy," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 30(10), pages 3337-3375.
    14. Piazzesi, M. & Schneider, M., 2016. "Housing and Macroeconomics," Handbook of Macroeconomics, in: J. B. Taylor & Harald Uhlig (ed.), Handbook of Macroeconomics, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 0, pages 1547-1640, Elsevier.
    15. Jia Pengfei & Lim King Yoong, 2021. "Tax Policy and Toxic Housing Bubbles in China," The B.E. Journal of Macroeconomics, De Gruyter, vol. 21(1), pages 151-183, January.
    16. Bian, Timothy Yang & Gete, Pedro, 2015. "What drives housing dynamics in China? A sign restrictions VAR approach," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 96-112.
    17. Daniel L. Tortorice, 2019. "Long-Run Expectations, Learning and the US Housing Market," Eastern Economic Journal, Palgrave Macmillan;Eastern Economic Association, vol. 45(4), pages 497-531, October.
    18. Chunping Liu & Zhirong Ou, 2021. "What determines China's housing price dynamics? New evidence from a DSGE‐VAR," International Journal of Finance & Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 26(3), pages 3269-3305, July.
    19. Huh, Sungjun & Kim, Insu, 2021. "Real estate and relative risk aversion with generalized recursive preferences," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 68(C).
    20. Khan, Hashmat & Rouillard, Jean-François, 2018. "Household borrowing constraints and residential investment dynamics," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 95(C), pages 1-18.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Heterogeneous households; Store of value; Housing policy; Aggregate and distributional effects; Consumption risk sharing;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • E21 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Consumption; Saving; Wealth
    • G11 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Portfolio Choice; Investment Decisions
    • G18 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Government Policy and Regulation
    • H31 - Public Economics - - Fiscal Policies and Behavior of Economic Agents - - - Household
    • R21 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - Household Analysis - - - Housing Demand

    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:eee:dyncon:v:130:y:2021:i:c:s016518892100124x. 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: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/jedc .

    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.