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"To measure the wealth-consumption ratio, we estimate an exponentially affine model of the stochastic discount factor on bond yields and stock returns. We use that discount factor to compute the no-arbitrage price of a claim to aggregate US consumption. Our estimates indicate that total wealth is much safer than stock market wealth. The consumption risk premium is only 2.2 percent, substantially below the equity risk premium of 6.9 percent. As a result, our estimate of the wealth-consumption ratio is much higher than the price-dividend ratio on stocks throughout the post-war period. The high wealth-consumption ratio implies that the average US household has a lot of wealth, most of it human wealth. A variance decomposition of the wealth-consumption ratio shows less return predictability overall, but most of the return predictability is for future interest rates, not excess returns. We conclude that the properties of the total wealth portfolio are more similar to those of a long-maturity bond portfolio than those of a stock portfolio. The differences that we find between the risk-return characteristics of equity and total wealth suggest that equity is a special asset class"--National Bureau of Economic Research web site

AbstractWe revisit the evidence on the effect of changes in household wealth on consumption using a panel of Australian states. We find that a one per cent increase in the value of housing wealth increases consumption by about 0.16 per cent in the long‐run, with half of the response occurring within two quarters. The size of this response has been stable over time and largely reflects changes in spending on motor vehicles, durable goods and other discretionary items. We then run counterfactual scenarios using the Reserve Bank of Australia's macroeconometric model, MARTIN, to assess the macroeconomic effects of changes in household wealth. We show that increases in household wealth supported household spending between 2013 and 2017, when growth in disposable income was weak.

Abstract
This paper provides an explanation for situations in which the fundamental state variables describing the economy do not change, but aggregate consumption experiences significant changes. We present a theory of pseudo-wealth—individuals' perceived wealth that is derived from expectations of gains in bets arising from heterogeneous expectations. This wealth is divorced from society's real assets. The creation of a market for bets necessarily generates positive pseudo-wealth. Changes in the magnitude of differences of prior beliefs will lead to changes in expected wealth and hence to changes in consumption, implying instability in aggregate and individual consumption and ex post intertemporal consumption misallocations. Moreover, 'completing markets' through the creation of a new market for bets can increase individual and aggregate risk. With a utilitarian social welfare function, completing markets leads to lower welfare ex post, but the first theorem of welfare economics (evaluating each individual's well-being on the basis of her ex ante beliefs) still holds, raising unsettling questions for welfare analysis. We also show that if the planner uses beliefs that are consistent, then the betting equilibrium would be Pareto inferior.

Recent contributions to the journal have commendably sought to extend agro‐food studies from production to consumption in line with the consumption turn across the social sciences. In doing so, and inspired by actor‐network theory, exception has been taken to the systems of provision approach to food studies. This approach is defended by suggesting that it has in part been misinterpreted as comprising an extension of agro‐food studies to consumption rather than a general approach to consumption per se applied to food in particular. In addition, the later turn of such agro‐food studies to consumption is shown to continue to lag behind the understanding of the culture of consumption that has evolved over the past decade. A plea is made for more constructive and informed dialogue with the literature on consumption.