Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/149313 
Year of Publication: 
2016
Series/Report no.: 
CESifo Working Paper No. 6226
Publisher: 
Center for Economic Studies and ifo Institute (CESifo), Munich
Abstract: 
Economists have long suspected that firm-to-firm relationships might increase price rigidity due to the use of explicit or implicit fixed-price contracts. Using transaction-level import data from the U.S. Census, I study the responsiveness of prices to exchange rate changes and show that prices are in fact substantially more responsive to these cost shocks in older versus newly formed relationships. Based on additional stylized facts about a relationship’s life cycle and interviews I conducted with purchasing managers, I develop a model in which a buyer-seller pair subject to persistent, stochastic shocks to production costs shares profit risk under limited commitment. Once structurally estimated, the model replicates the empirical correlation between relationship age and the responsiveness of prices to shocks. My results suggest that changes to the average length of relationships in the economy - e.g., in a recession, when the share of young relationships declines - can influence price exibility and hence the effectiveness of monetary policy.
Subjects: 
relationships
price rigidity
pass through
JEL: 
E30
F10
F20
Document Type: 
Working Paper
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