Microeconomic lumpiness matters for macroeconomics. According to our DSGE model, it is responsible for 92 percent of the smoothing in the investment response to aggregate shocks, and it introduces important nonlinearities and history dependance in business cycles and policy sensitivity. General...

Using a unique German firm-level data set, this paper is the first to jointlystudy the cyclical properties of the cross-sections of firm-level real value addedand Solow residual innovations, as well as capital and employment adjustment.We find two new business cycle facts: 1) The cross-sectional...

Is time-varying firm-level uncertainty a major cause or amplifier of the businesscycle? This paper investigates this question in the context of a heterogeneousfirmRBC model with persistent firm-level productivity shocks and lumpy capitaladjustment, where cyclical changes in uncertainty...

When employers face a trade-off between growing large and paying low wages—that is, when they have monopsony power—some productive employers will decide to acquire fewer customers, forgo sales, and remain small. These decisions have adverse consequences for aggregate labor productivity....

This paper examines how households adjusted their consumption behavior in response to COVID-19 infection risk during the early phase of the pandemic. We use a monthly consumption survey specifically designed by the German Statistical Office covering the second wave of COVID-19 infections from...

This article discusses the economic effects of a potential cut-off of the German economy from Russian energy imports. We show that the effects are likely to be substantial but manageable. In the short run, a stop of Russian energy imports would lead to a GDP decline in range between 0.5% and 3%...

When employers face a trade-off between being large and paying low wages - and in this sense have monopsony power - some productive employers decide to acquire few customers, forgo sales, and remain small. These decisions have adverse consequences for aggregate labor productivity. Using...