This paper investigates the time delay in the transmission of oil price shocks using disaggregated manufacturing data on inventories and sales. VAR estimates indicate that industry-level inventories and sales respond faster to an oil price shock than aggregate gross domestic product, especially in industries that are energy-intensive. In response to an unexpected oil price increase, sales drop and inventories are accumulated. This leads to future reductions in production. We estimate a modified linear–quadratic inventory model to inquire whether the patterns observed in the VAR impulse responses are consistent with rational behavior by the firms. Estimation results suggest that three mechanisms play a role in the industry-level dynamics. First, oil prices act as a negative demand shock. Second, the shock catches manufacturers by surprise, resulting in higher-than-anticipated inventories. Third, because of their desire to smooth production, manufacturers deviate from the target level of inventories and spread the decline in production over various quarters; hence the delay in the response of aggregate output.

The paper investigates whether US regions respond differently to shocks in the crude oil market. We disentangle oil market shocks into distinct demand and supply shocks and examine the response of regional personal income to these shocks. Results indicate that for most regions, oil supply shocks decrease real personal income. Except for the Rocky Mountains and the Southwest, global aggregate demand shocks are recessionary, typically about a year and a half after the shock. When we split our data into oil-producing and non-oil-producing regions, we find that global aggregate demand shocks have no effect on oil-producing regions but cause a decrease in income in non-oil-producing regions. Our analysis further indicates that oil-specific demand shocks have positive and persistent impacts on oil-producing regions but are recessionary in non-oil-producing regions. We also document significant asymmetries in the regional responses to small versus large oil shocks. In addition, the paper shows that regional differences in industrial composition explain some of the variation in the responses of real regional personal income to oil shocks.

This paper reviews some of the literature on the macroeconomic effects of oil price shocks with a particular focus on possible nonlinearities in the relation and recent new results obtained by Kilian and Vigfusson [http://www-personal.umich/~lkilian/kvsubmission.pdf (2009)].