Are business cicles asymetric?Some European evidence
Year of publication: 1997
Issue: 8
Type: Working paper
Abstract
Economic thought has often regarded business cicles as asymmetric. This paper examines the existence of asymmetries over the business cycle in three European countries: France, Germany and the United Kingdom. To analyze this issue, industrial production in these countries from 1957 to 1994 is examined, and quarterly contractions and expansions in this variable are compared. The results obtained with both parametric and nonparametric methods allow the existence of asymmetries in these countries to be questioned.