Sources of macroeconomic fluctuations in Turkey : evidence from a structural vector autoregressive approach

Part of : MIBES Transactions : international journal ; Vol.5, No.1, 2011, pages 90-104

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90-104
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Abstract:
The analysis of business cycle is one of the most important steps for both healthy evaluation of economic developments and construction of accurate economic policies. There still have been debates among different schools of thought about the sources of business cycles and notably, the impulse propagation mechanisms, not providing a consensus about the subject. Nowadays, those debates go on between the economists from Keynesian and Classical tradition, namely New Keynesian and Real Business Cycle theories. The focal point of the argument is to distinguish the shocks as a source of business cycle fluctuations. Keynesian theory sees the aggregate demand as the dominant source of changes in output. Real Business Cycle Theory assumes that the fluctuations in the economy are produced mainly due to changes in real factors, particularly shifts in technology, preference or taste, affecting the aggregate supply. By employing structural vector autoregression (SVAR) technique, in this study we try to identify those shocks that impact Turkish economy and to construct the dynamic responses caused by these shocks. The results of the study suggest that the fluctuations in real output is mainly due to supply shocks both in the short and long-runs. Also, domestic supply shocks, defined as productivity shocks, are the most important disturbances in explaining output fluctuations. Consequently, for a true understanding of the developments in Turkish economy and design of economic policies that enable stable and sustained long-run economic growth, the results of the study have to be evaluated carefully.
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Keywords:
business cycle, structural VAR, real business cycle theory, shocks, impulse response, variance decomposition
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