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Article

The Great Moderation in Economic Volatility: A View from the States

Gerald A. Carlino

Emeritus Economist

Q1 2007

Business Review — Since the middle of the 1980s, economic growth in the U.S. has become much more stable than it was in the preceding three decades.

And the magnitude of the decline is substantial. What accounts for the decline in volatility, and why is the decline important for policymakers? In this article, Jerry Carlino discusses these questions and makes the case that using state-level data, rather than just national data, offers a much larger testing ground for analyzing the decline in economic volatility.

This article appeared in the First Quarter 2007 edition of Business Review.

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