The size, frequency and synchronization of price adjustment: microeconomic evidence

This paper presents non-parametric microeconomic evidence on stores’ price setting behavior and evaluates the findings in light of theories of nominal price rigidity. The main issues include the durability of price quotations, the size, the frequency and the across-store and within-store synchronization of price changes. The analysis is based on a unique, high frequency panel data set of consumer prices recorded between 1993 and 1996 in Hungary. The results indicate that basic price adjustment patterns tend to be consistent with implications of two-sided (S,s) pricing models. Other popular macroeconomic models of price setting are boldly violated by the data.