Stability through cycles

Economic variables like GDP growth, employment, interest rates and consumption show signs of cyclical behavior. Many variables display multiple cycles, with lengths ranging in between 5 to even up to 100 years. We argue that multiple cycles can be associated with long-run stability of the economic system, provided that the cycle lengths are such that interference is rare or absent. For a large sample of important variables, including key variables for the US, UK and the Netherlands, we document that this is indeed the case.