In this paper we argue that the main empirical findings about firm diversification and performance are actually consistent with a resource-based view of corporate diversification, where firms seek to maximize shareholder value. In our model, diversification is the natural result of firm growth...

A search-theoretic model of equilibrium unemployment is constructed and shown to be consistent with the key regularities of the labor market and business cycle. The two distinguishing features of the model are: (i) the decision to accept or reject jobs is modeled explicitly, and (ii) markets are...

reasonable amount of aggregate volatility.

the consequences of this policy for economy-wide quantities such as investment and consumption. Contrary to conventional wisdom we find that changes in tax policy have only a small effect on equilibrium levels of corporate leverage. The intuition lies in the endogenous adjustment of debt prices...

We examine the effects of long-lived nominal debt contracts in a quantitative business cycle model with financial frictions. In our setting, as in reality, firms fund themselves with a mix of nominal defaultable debt and equity securities to issue in every period. Debt is priced fairly taking...

In this paper we investigate the theoretical relation between financial leverage and stock returns in a dynamic world where both the corporate investment and financing decisions are endogenous. We find that the link between leverage and stock returns is more complex than the static textbook...

cross-section, a strategy that is long on durables and short on services earns a sizable risk premium. In the time series, a strategy that is long on durables and short on the market portfolio earns a countercyclical risk premium. We develop an equilibrium asset-pricing model that explains these...

To generate persistence we augment the standard real business cycle (RBC) model with a ``learning by doing'' (LBD) mechanism, where current labor supply affects workers' future labor productivity. Our econometric analysis shows that the LBD model fits aggregate data much better than the standard...