Business Cycle Asymmetry in China: Evidence from Friedman's Plucking Model

Friedman's plucking model of business fluctuations suggests that output cannot exceed an upper limit, but it is occasionally "plucked" downward below trends as a result of economic recessions. This paper investigates China's business fluctuations using quarterly real GDP data for the period 1978-2009. Our results show some evidence supporting Friedman's plucking model. We find that a ceiling effect of real output exists, and that negative asymmetric shocks significantly affect the transitory component, which captures the plucking downward behavior during the recession. The results also suggest that the basic asymmetric unobserved component model is not appropriate for directly modeling China's real output because the business cycle is inaccurately measured, but it works quite well when considering a structural break in the second quarter of 1992. The results reveal that although China's economy strengthened in the second quarter of 2009, it is essential for China's government to take further positive and effective measures to maintain sustainable development of the economy.