• Environmental and Resource Economics Review
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• v.29 no.2
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• pp.171-194
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• 2020

We revisit the impact of oil shocks on the Korean economy and examine how this impact varies depending on a business cycle. First, we estimate the probability of a recession through a logistic probability distribution, and correct the probability to match business cycles announced by the Korea National Statistical Office. We set up a STVAR model to analyze the response of macroeconomic variables to oil shocks according to business cycles. We find that oil shocks during the recession have a negative effect on GDP in the mid- and long-term, but during the expansion, GDP does not show a statistically significant response to oil shocks. We presume that this finding is associated with the factors of both the increase in demand for consumption and the increase in current account during the economic boom. Also, we find that the impact of oil shocks on the price level was also observed differently in terms of the persistence of inflation by business cycle. These results highlight the importance of an application of a regime switching model, which has been widely used in energy economics in recent years.