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This research aims to investigate whether and to what extent the co-movements of cross-country business cycles, cross-country stock market cycles and cross-country real estate market cycles are linked across G7 from February 1990 to June 2014.

The empirical approaches include correlation analysis on Hodrick–Prescott (HP) cycles, HP cycle return spillovers effects using Diebold and Yilmaz’s (2012) spillover index methodology, as well as Croux et al.’s (2001) dynamic correlation and cohesion methodology.

There are fairly strong cycle-return spillover effects between the cross-country business cycles, cross-country stock market cycles and cross-country real estate market cycles. The interactions among the cross-country business cycles, cross-country stock market cycles and cross-country real estate market cycles in G7 are less positively pronounced or exhibit counter-cyclical behavior at the traditional business cycle (medium-term) frequency band when “pure” stock market cycles are considered.

The research is subject to the usual limitations concerning empirical research.

This study finds that real estate is an important factor in influencing the degree and behavior of the relationship between cross-country business cycles and cross-country stock market cycles in G7. It provides important empirical insights for portfolio investors to understand and forecast the differential benefits and pitfalls of portfolio diversification in the long-, medium- and short-cycle horizons, as well as for research studying the linkages between the real economy and financial sectors.

In adding to the existing body of knowledge concerning economic globalization and financial market interdependence, this study evaluates the linkages between business cycles, stock market cycles and public real estate market cycles cross G7 and adds to the academic real estate literature. Because public real estate market is a subset of stock market, our approach is to use an original stock market index, as well as a “pure” stock market index (with the influence of real estate market removed) to offer additional empirical insights from two key complementary perspectives.

Reappraises the stylised facts of the contemporary UK business cycle and the robustness of associated sample moments to detrending under the Hodrick‐Prescott (HP) filter and an unobserved components (UC) model based on the structural time series mode of Harvey and advocated in this context by Harvey and Jaeger. For the majority of series considered, findings broadly confirm the earlier HP‐based results of Blackburn and Ravn, but important differences with previous results are reported for labour productivity, the real wage and the real interest rate. However, under neither detrending method are the anticipated cross‐correlations between output and the pivotal variables in standard real business cycle (RBC) models (labour productivity, real wages, the real interest rate and nominal variables) simultaneously confirmed. Indeed, on balance, these results may be interpreted as more suggestive of an orthodox demand‐led or policy‐induced cycle.

Seeks to present the detailed empirical study of contemporary business fluctuations in Korea. Follows the methodology of modern business cycle research in conducting an atheoretical statistical analysis of the cyclical properties of key aggregate time series. Shows, by analysis, that many of the cyclical regularities documented for developed countries also exist in Korean business cycles. Regularities include the relative volatilities of many expenditure components and the co‐movement of real and nominal variables with output. Particularly of note is the counter‐cyclicality of prices. Posits that counter‐cyclicality of prices signals the importance of supply side shocks in Korean business fluctuations. Reveals, in the analysis, that the fluctuation in the import price of oil may have been the major source of Korean business cycles. States that analysis has also revealed that there are some idiosyncrasies in Korean business cycles. Net exports are significantly pro‐cyclical and lead the cycle for most of the period under study.

The discourse on credit cycles has been reinvigorated following the global crisis. The purpose of this paper is to contrast the positions of mainstream, Marxist, Austrian and post-Keynesian (PK) schools of thought on these matters. It is posited that most notions underplay the significance of real economy factors in shaping the fluctuations of credit levels and relations. It is argued these ideas are best illustrated by Marx (as interpreted by the Temporal Single System Interpretation) and tendency for the profit rate to fall with accumulation. Empirical evidence on the UK profit rate is provided as supporting evidence.

The paper explores the theoretical work on credit and business cycles from the relevant schools of thought and contrasts them. The aim is to consider which approach best describes the reality. Empirical work on the profit rate provides supporting evidence.

It is argued that the mainstream view of monetary neutrality is an insufficient explanation of the financial reality associated with credit and business cycles. Instead, it is posited that the PK approach, which emphasizes productive and financial factors, is more preferable. This contrasts with the usual singular financialization commentary that is used to describe the financial crisis and real economy stagnation that followed. It is argued that Marx’s notion of falling profit and its ramifications best explain the reality of both the credit and business cycle. This is supported by the evidence.

It is problematic to calculate a Marxian rate of profit given the lack of suitable reported statistics. The research illustrates the significance of productive factors, especially the tendency for the profit rate to fall, in driving business cycles. There are, therefore, implications for government fiscal/monetary/industrial policies to reflect these factors when seeking to influence the business cycle.

Policies that are designed to target levels of profitability are likely to be beneficial for capitalist sustainability.

The focus on profitability in the paper informs individuals working in business organizations of some of the imperatives facing corporations in a modern competitive environment.

Whether financial factors drive the business cycle, or are themselves driven by it, is an important question given that policy prescriptions will differ depending on the answer. The recent financialization commentary, for instance, suggests that better regulation or reform of the financial sector will preclude unstable business cycles. The paper argues, in contrast, that the cause of the credit instability is rooted in production (following Marx) and that, therefore, a more production-focused policy response is required whilst recognizing the instabilities of the credit system. This latter point has a measure of originality in the current discourse.

This chapter investigates the nature of the transformation of macroeconomics by focusing on the impact of the Great Depression on economic doctrines. There is no doubt that the Great Depression exerted an enormous influence on economic thought, but the exact nature of its impact should be examined more carefully. In this chapter, I examine the transformation from a perspective which emphasizes the interaction between economic ideas and economic events, and the interaction between theory and policy rather than the development of economic theory. More specifically, I examine the evolution of what became known as macroeconomics after the Depression in terms of an ongoing debate among the “stabilizers” and their critics. I further suggest using four perspectives, or schools of thought, as measures to locate the evolution and transformation; the gold standard mentality, liquidationism, the Treasury view, and the real-bills doctrine. By highlighting these four economic ideas, I argue that what happened during the Great Depression was the retreat of the gold standard mentality, the complete demise of liquidationism and the Treasury view, and the strange survival of the real-bills doctrine. Each of those transformations happened not in response to internal debates in the discipline, but in response to government policies and real-world events.

Provides an overview of the real business cycle research agenda, tackling the main theoretical and empirical issues. Concludes that although this methodological approach has been popular in terms of the number of papers published, it has not been completely convincing in providing a theory of the business cycle.

We develop a framework for measuring and monitoring business cycles in real time. Following a long tradition in macroeconometrics, inference is based on a variety of indicators of economic activity, treated as imperfect measures of an underlying index of business cycle conditions. We extend existing approaches by permitting for heterogenous lead–lag patterns of the various indicators along the business cycles. The framework is well suited for high-frequency monitoring of current economic conditions in real time – nowcasting – since inference can be conducted in the presence of mixed frequency data and irregular patterns of data availability. Our assessment of the underlying index of business cycle conditions is accurate and more timely than popular alternatives, including the Chicago Fed National Activity Index (CFNAI). A formal real-time forecasting evaluation shows that the framework produces well-calibrated probability nowcasts that resemble the consensus assessment of the Survey of Professional Forecasters.

This paper aims to study the structural dynamic behaviour of the depositors, banks and investors and the role of banks in the business cycles. The authors test the hypothesis: do banks’ behaviour make oscillations in the economy via interest rate?

The authors dichotomized banking activities into two markets: deposit and loan. The first market forms deposit interest rate, and the second market forms credit interest rate. The authors show that these two types of interest rates have non-synchronized structures, and that is why money sector fluctuation starts. As a result, the fluctuation is transferred to the real economy through saving and investment functions.

The empirical results show that in the USA, the banking system creates fluctuations in money and real economy, as well as through interest rates. Short-term interest rates had complex roots in their characteristic, while medium and long-term interest rates, though they were second-order difference equations, had real characteristic roots. However, short-term interest rates are the source of oscillation and form the business cycles.

The authors tested the hypothesis for USA economy, while it needs to be tested for other economies as well.

The results show that though the source of fluctuations in the real economy comes from short-term interest rates, medium- and long-term interest rates dampen real economy fluctuations and also work as economic stabilisers.

Regarding the applied method, the topic is new.

This chapter sheds new light on the linkages between stock market fluctuations and business cycles in Asia. It shows that at cyclical frequencies stock markets lead business cycles by six months on average. China, Korea, and Taiwan constitute exceptions, as their real and stock market cycles are contemporaneously synchronized. The low level of maturity of these markets offers a potential explanation of this outcome. Furthermore, we find that the linkage also holds during phases of cyclical upswing and downturn, with the exception of China, where the financial market lags behind industrial production during expansions. Finally, for most of the countries (except Thailand and Malaysia), the linkage is also robust to the presence of financial crises.