Sub-Saharan Africa's rising public debt stock: Is there a cause for concern?

The study investigated public debt sustainability in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) by testing the reaction of the primary balance to positive and negative shocks in public debts in a panel of 45 SSA countries. The study adopts the innovative nonlinear fiscal reaction function and the dynamic panel threshold model to account for the potential asymmetric phenomenon in the public debt series. In line with extant studies, the study found that public debts in SSA are weakly sustainable and there is a highly procyclical fiscal policy bias in SSA countries, particularly in resource-rich countries, indicating that governments' fiscal policy responses are expansionary during economic upturns and contractionary during recessions, which may aggravate recessions and worsen debt situations across SSA. For robustness, the study compares the results with emerging and developed economies. The results indicate that in advanced economies, public debt is sustainable and that fiscal policy response is countercyclical. The research and policy implications are discussed.     

Nonlinear Effects of Fiscal Policy on Private Consumption： Evidence from China

In the present paper, we use the Markov‐switching model to test the nonlinear effects of government expenditure and taxes on private consumption in China. The results show that fiscal policy in China has a significantly nonlinear effect. In years 1978–1980 and 1984–1997, the effect of government consumption on private consumption is non‐Keynesian. During the same periods, the effect of taxes is also non‐Keynesian, but the effect is not significant. The effect of government investment is linear but asymmetric. After retesting the reasons for the existence of nonlinear effects, we find that in China initial fiscal conditions and the magnitude of fiscal consolidations are not related to the nonlinear effects of fiscal policy. The government should pay close attention to the characteristics of commodity and labor markets to identify the conditions and regimes associated with nonlinear effects.     

The Macroeconomics Effects of Government Spending Under Fiscal Foresight

Consumption and output responses to fiscal shocks are studied in a model with fiscal foresight. Fiscal foresight reduces both output multipliers and consumption. However, key features such as sticky wages, credit constrained households and elastic labour supply, are able to generate both sizeable output multipliers and positive consumption, in effect preserving key Keynesian effects. This model fits a developing economy like South Africa well since it is able to capture transparent communication of government as well as control for credit constrained consumption and sticky wages.     

我国货币政策对房地产价格的非线性效应分析-基于MS - VAR模型的实证分析

通过建立三区制下的MSVAR模型,研究了货币量、市场利率、信贷余额和汇率对房地产价格的非线性影响。研究表明：各经济时期的区制转移特征明显,而扩张性的货币政策比收缩性货币政策更难发挥效果。经济扩张期下,利率政策能较好抑制房价;经济稳定期下货币供应量的稳定房价效果最好;而经济衰退期下前两种措施均失效,信贷渠道能发挥更大的作用。     

Sectoral Wage Rigidities and Labour and Product Market Institutions in the Euro Area

We estimate wage Phillips curve relationships between sectoral wage growth, unemployment and productivity in a country-industry panel of euro area countries. We find that institutional rigidities – such as labour and product market institutions and regulations – limit the adjustment of euro area wages to unemployment, in both upturns and downturns, particularly in manufacturing and, to a lesser extent, in the construction and service sectors. In addition, there are further limitations in the response of wages to changes in unemployment during economic downturns which suggests that euro area wages are also characterised by significant downward wage rigidities, especially in the manufacturing sector. These results are robust to specifications that account for factors that may affect structural unemployment (such as duration-dependent unemployment effects), as well as changes in the skill composition of employment that may affect the evolution of aggregate wages. The results also hold for panels including or excluding the public sector (where wages may be determined differently to the private sector also due to the effects of fiscal consolidation on public sector wages during the crisis). From a policy perspective, reforms in product and labour markets which reduce wage rigidities can facilitate employment growth and enhance the rebalancing process in the euro area.     

Sensitivity of fiscal-policy effects to policy coordination and business cycle conditions

This paper deals with the problems of assessing the effects of fiscal policy in the European Monetary Union. Here, we face wide cross-country differences in key fiscal parameters, some of which may also be vary over time (business cycle). Moreover, these effects may also depend on trade spillover effects and thus on the extent of policy coordination. Our empirical analyses make use of data for 15 EU countries, mainly for the period 1970–2011. The results clearly indicate that fiscal multipliers are not constant across countries and time, being much larger during economic recessions. By contrast, the policy coordination-effects appear to be more homogenous, although it turns out that small countries may benefit more from coordination.     

ZONE‐TARGETING MONETARY POLICY PREFERENCES AND FINANCIAL MARKET CONDITIONS: A FLEXIBLE NON‐LINEAR POLICY REACTION FUNCTION OF THE SARB MONETARY POLICY

We estimate a flexible model of the monetary policy reaction function of the South African Reserve Bank based on a representation of the policymaker's preferences that capture asymmetries and zone‐targeting behaviours. We augment the analysis to allow for responses to financial market conditions over and above inflation and output stabilisation to address the current debate on the importance of financial asset prices in monetary policy decision making. The empirical results show that the monetary authorities' response to inflation is zone symmetric. Secondly, the monetary authorities' response to output is asymmetric with increased reaction during business cycle downturns relative to upturns. Thirdly, the monetary authorities pay close attention to the financial conditions index by placing an equal weight on financial market booms and recessions.     

Crises in Asia: Historical perspectives and implications

The paper analyzes the stylized features of historical crisis episodes for 21 developing Asian economies over 1961–2007. The paper finds that while there is substantial diversity, on average, recessions and financial downturns are more frequent, longer lasting, and more severe in Asia than in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development countries. The paper also finds that the likelihood and severity of a recession tends to increase when it is associated with credit crunches or stock market crashes. Severe financial downturns or recessions in the global economy are often coupled with financial crises or recessions in Asia. In view of the current global crisis and severe financial downturns, Asian economies are expected to experience a severe recession in 2009.     

中国持有美国资产的风险

中国持有约1.4万亿美元美国金融资产,近90%为政府担保债券。如果美国继续巨额财政赤字和宽松货币政策,汇率政策调整及储备货币地位丧失引发美元贬值的风险将上升。未来几年美元对外实际价值下降的可能性较低,利率风险与以往美国经济衰退期接近,股市波动影响较大。中国所持美元资产的风险短期内来自市场波动,长期依赖于美国财政及货币纪律。     

财政支出、贸易条件与实际利率水平

本文主要是分析当一国实行扩张性的财政政策时，它对投资支出以及国际实际利率水平的影响。研究显示，扩张性的财政政策会导致世界各国的投资支出负向变动。这是由于财政支出会造成实际利率水平的变动，而世界各国对实际利率水平变化的反应是非对称性的，所以投资支出的变动有所差别。这种现象主要取决于下述因素：一是政府财政支出倾向对消费支出倾向的替代程度；二是消费跨期替代弹性的大小。     

The role of fiscal policy in Japan: a quantitative study

This paper analyzes the role of fiscal policy in the recent slowdown in Japan. A dynamic general equilibrium model is developed in which fiscal policy can have both expansionary effects (through increasing returns) and contractionary effects (through the increase of public debt and tax burden). A version of the model is calibrated to the Japanese economy and is used to measure the importance of both these effects. We find that, under a wide range of parameters, net expansionary effects are quantitatively small, thus suggesting a limited role for fiscal stabilization     

Do Business Cycles Affect State Appropriations to Higher Education?

Spending on higher education constitutes an important and increasing portion of state government spending and a major source of operating funds at public institutions of higher education. Anecdotal evidence suggests that state appropriations are subject to cyclical variation. An analysis of state appropriations to higher education, enrollment in two- and four-year public colleges and universities, and state-specific measures of the business cycle for all 50 states over the period 1969-1994 shows that state appropriations to higher education are highly sensitive to changes in the business cycle. A 1% change in real per capita income was, on average, associated with a 1.39% change in real state appropriations per full-time equivalent student enrolled. This implied decline in state government funding, coupled with the increase in enrollment in higher education during recessions reported by Betts and McFarland (1995), suggest that public institutions of higher education may experience fiscal stress during economic downturns. These results also suggest that state legislators and education policymakers should reconsider their higher education funding policies during recessions in order to allow public colleges and universities to provide dislocated workers with access to quality education and training during these periods.     

Decomposing local fiscal multipliers: Evidence from Japan

Recent studies on fiscal policy use cross-sectional data and estimate local fiscal multipliers along with spillovers. This paper estimates local fiscal multipliers with spillovers using Japanese prefectural data comparable with the national accounts. We estimate the local fiscal multiplier on output to be 1.7 at the regional level. We decompose the regional fiscal multiplier into the prefectural fiscal multiplier and the region-wide effect. Converting the latter component into the spillover, we find that the spillover is positive and small in size. We also decompose the regional fiscal multiplier on output into multipliers on the expenditure components. Our estimates suggest that there are crowding-in effects of government spending on consumption and investment. Moreover, we find that the regional fiscal multiplier on absorption exceeds 2.0 and that the spillover to absorption is considerable in contrast to the spillover to output.     

The need for economic policy coordination between Europe,Japan, and the United States: Policy recommendations for the 1990s

Better policy coordination between Europe, Japan, and the United States is urgently needed in order to restore economic growth and to diminish mutual trade imbalances. Using the EC Compact model it is shown how coordinated fiscal policies can contribute to reaching these goals in the 1990s. For Europe, the most plausible fiscal policy option seems to be a combination of lower direct taxes, public spending cuts, and wage moderation; for Japan a more expansionary fiscal policy is feasible. For the United States, however, public spending cuts or tax increases are necessary conditions for better economic performance. In addition, for all three blocks a swap between tax reduction and wage moderation is recommended.     

Monetary vs. fiscal policy: Some evidence from vector autoregression for India

This paper investigates the relative importance of monetary and fiscal policy for India. Unlike previous studies, a more general approach of multivariate vector autoregression has been employed. Analysis of the causality results based on the joint F-tests and the dynamic multipliers based on the variance decompositions and the impulse response functions unambiguously support the Keynesian stance on the importance of fiscal policy. There is very little evidence of exogeneity of money supply, undermining the validity of the monetarist proposition. On the contrary, Indian monetary policy appears to have accommodated changes in government expenditure, prices and output, lending support to the structuralist-Mundellian views.     

Changing impact of fiscal policy on selected ASEAN countries

This paper investigates the effectiveness of fiscal policy in five Association of Southeast Asian Nations: Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand. Through a small open economy structural vector autoregression model, government spending is found to have weak and largely insignificant impact on output, while taxes are found to have outcomes contrary to conventional theory. Extensions using a time-varying VAR model reveal that the positive impact from higher taxes on output mainly reflects heightened concerns over public finances during the Asian financial crisis and the recent global financial crisis. On the other hand, for Thailand, there is some evidence that government spending can at times be useful as a tool for short-term countercyclical policy.     

Crises in Asia: Recovery and policy responses

The goal of this paper is to provide stylized facts on recovery from economic downturns and to evaluate the role of macroeconomic policies in promoting recovery. In particular, we examine gross domestic product (GDP) recessions and financial downturns (credit contractions and stock price declines) using data from 21 Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) economies and 21 developing Asian economies. We find, in general, recovery from a GDP recession in the Asian economies is somewhat slower than in the OECD economies. However, recovery from a financial downturn is not much different between Asia and the OECD. We also find the OECD economies have been more active and effective in using counter-cyclical policies than the Asian economies in the face of GDP recessions and financial downturns. Recent evidence, however, suggests the Asian economies may have better success in the current global crisis.     

Local fiscal multipliers and population aging in Japan

This study examines how the effectiveness of fiscal policy depends on population aging. To this end, this study estimates the local fiscal multipliers in Japan. Results suggest that the estimated local fiscal multiplier on output is larger in non-aged areas than aged areas, and that the effects on the number of workers are not statistically significant in either area type. Additionally, the multipliers on private investment are only higher than one in non-aged prefectures. Results also indicate that the multiplier generated by an increase in government investment is larger than that in government consumption. These results indicate fewer slack resources in aged areas that can be mobilized in response to increased government spending.     

关于扩张性财政政策之收入分配效应的研究——刍议不断扩张性财政支出的归宿

基于城乡居民的资源禀赋和生产函数的差别,本文通过构建中国城乡二元结构的经济增长模型,分析了扩张性的财政投入对城乡居民收入分配的一般影响。研究认为,不断加强的财政刺激在提高城市经济增长,增加城市居民收入的同时,也扩大着中国城乡居民的收入差距。作者利用1980~2008年的有关数据,建立计量经济VAR模型进行实证分析,验证了上述结论。为了改善扩张性财政投入产生的不尽如人意的收入分配效应,据此,提出相关的政策调整建议。     

Unemployment information and wives’ labor supply responses to husbands’ job loss in Taiwan

Motivated by declining labor market opportunities in Taiwan, this study examines adjustments to wives' work patterns based on husbands' job loss for both unskilled and skilled labor families. Explicitly taking information acquired before job losses into account, married couples' dynamic labor supply equations are estimated by using a short pseudo-panel data set of Manpower Utilization Survey (MUS) in Taiwan during the period of 1993–2006. Our results indicate that the AWE in skilled families exhibits almost twice as big as those in unskilled families. When husbands' job loss is compounded with district- or industry-specific unemployment information, wives have slightly higher probabilities of labor force entry than those in the traditional model, and the probabilities increase with the length of observation. A comparison of the asymmetric response of the unskilled and the skilled wives suggests that facing husbands' job loss, unskilled wives respond to both economic downturns and upturns, but skilled wives only respond to economic downturns.