Business Cycle Phases in U.S. States

Wall, Howard J.; Owyang, Michael; Piger, Jeremy

doi:10.2139/ssrn.407706

Business Cycle Phases in U.S. States

FRB of St. Louis Working Paper No. 2003-011

35 Pages Posted: 17 Jun 2003

See all articles by Howard J. Wall

Howard J. Wall

Lindenwood University - Center for Economics and the Environment

Michael Owyang

Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis - Research Division

Jeremy Piger

University of Oregon - Department of Economics

Date Written: June 2003

Abstract

The U.S. aggregate business cycle is often characterized as a series of distinct recession and expansion phases. We apply a regime-switching model to state-level coincident indexes and conclude that state business cycles also can be characterized in this way. We find also that states differ a great deal in the levels of growth that they experience within each phase and that they do not necessarily experience the phases in tandem. Further, there are significant differences between states in the extent to which their business cycle phases are in sync with those of the aggregate economy.

JEL Classification: E32, R12

Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation

Wall, Howard J. and Owyang, Michael T. and Piger, Jeremy M., Business Cycle Phases in U.S. States (June 2003). FRB of St. Louis Working Paper No. 2003-011, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=407706 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.407706