La consommation privée en Belgique

This paper analyses the path of private consumption and its main macroeconomic determinants. These are related to the life-cycle approach which helps explaining consumption smoothing. In that respect, it is important to go beyond the simple correlation between current disposable income and consumption to incorporate future income expectations and wealth. As for this latter, the paper also proceeds to a careful description of the mechanisms at work in the wealth effect and of the structure of Belgian households' wealth. Empirically, it is shown that in Belgium human wealth plays a far larger ro... Mehr ...