The decline in output volatility in a number of countries over the past few decades has been well-documented, though less agreement has been reached about the causes of this decline. In this paper, we use a panel of data from 20 OECD countries to see if there is a role for various indicators of...

Over the past decade or so, aggregate data suggest a trend increase in housing equity withdrawal in Australia, potentially stimulating household spending. However, there has been little disaggregated information on how equity is being withdrawn and injected, the characteristics of households...

Over the past decade, household debt (as a share of household income) has reached historically high levels. This has raised concerns about whether, as a result of the rise in debt, households are now more financially ‘fragile’. Using data from the 1998/99 Household Expenditure Survey (HES),...