Distribution, wealth and demand regimes in historical perspective: the USA, the UK, France and Germany, 1855–2010

Most empirical macroeconomic research is limited to the period since World War II. This paper analyses the effects of changes in income distribution and in private wealth on consumption and investment covering a period from as early as 1855 through to 2010 for the UK, France, Germany and the USA, based on the data set of Piketty and Zucman (2014). We contribute to the study of wealth effects, of financialization, and of the nature of demand regimes. We find that overall domestic demand has been wage-led in the USA, the UK and Germany. Total investment responds positively to higher wage shares, which is driven by residential investment. For corporate investment alone, we find a negative relation. Wealth effects are found to be positive and significant for consumption in the USA and the UK, but weaker in France and Germany. Investment is negatively affected by private wealth in the USA and the UK, but positively in France and Germany.

Spatial Variation in the 2020 Housing Market Decline and Recovery

After plunging in the spring due to the COVID-19 pandemic, residential investment had a strong recovery in the second half of 2020. The initial decline resulted from both a disruption in activity due to social distancing, a broad-based drop in demand from economic uncertainty, and reduced access to credit (DeSanctis 2020).

Wspólnie czy indywidualnie? Na własność czy wynajem? Wszystkim czy wybranym? Dylematy współczesnej polskiej polityki mieszkaniowej

The article contains an overview of the housing situation in Poland in three dimensions: the availability of housing, the capacity to buy or rent a dwelling and the quality of housing standards in the context of the national and local housing policies. It begins with an assessment of the scale and dynamics of residential investment in Poland over the last 30 years. In the next part, the author estimates the economic return on housing investments, stressing that expectations as to the growth of housing prices in Poland are the key determinant of investment decisions. As the analysis shows, the promotion of housing ownership has had negative social effects and, with temporarily cheap and available money, has fuelled the growth of housing prices.

Learning from House Prices: Amplification and Business Fluctuations

We formalize the idea that house price changes may drive rational waves of optimism and pessimism in the economy. In our model, a house price increase caused by aggregate disturbances may be misinterpreted as a sign of higher local permanent income, leading households to demand more consumption and housing. Higher demand reinforces the initial price increase in an amplification loop that drives comovement in output, labor, residential investment, land prices, and house prices even in response to aggregate supply shocks. The qualitative implications of our otherwise frictionless model are consistent with observed business cycles and it can explain the economic impact of apparently autonomous changes in sentiment without resorting to non-fundamental shocks or nominal rigidity.

Fixing Up after Tearing Down: The Impact of Demolitions on Residential Investment

Does the presence of deteriorating housing affect nearby property owner’s decision to maintain their units? Does demolishing these distressed houses increase nearby homeowner’s maintenance investment? In this paper, I examine these questions by testing whether exposure to targeted demolitions of abandoned and distressed housing affects changes in the external condition of nearby houses. Using two waves of a property inventory in Cleveland, Ohio, my models suggest that, compared with a control group of houses located near vacant housing, proximity to demolitions decreases the likelihood that a property’s condition deteriorated between 2015 and 2018 and increases the likelihood that it improved.