Do Good Institutions Promote Countercyclical Macroeconomic Policies?

The literature has argued that developing countries are unable to adopt countercyclical monetary and fiscal policies due to financial imperfections and unfavourable political‐economy conditions. Using a world sample of up to 112 industrial and developing countries for 1984–2008, we find that the level of institutional quality plays a key role in countries’ ability and willingness to implement countercyclical macroeconomic policies. Countries with strong (weak) institutions adopt countercyclical (procyclical) macroeconomic policies, reflected in extended monetary policy and fiscal policy rules. The threshold levels of institutional quality at which policies are acyclical are found to be similar for monetary and fiscal policy.     

Dynamics of fiscal financing in the United States

General equilibrium models that include policy rules for government spending, lump-sum transfers, and distortionary taxation on labor and capital income and on consumption expenditures are fit to US data under rich specifications of fiscal policy rules to obtain several results. First, the best-fitting model allows many fiscal instruments to respond to debt. Second, responses of aggregates to fiscal policy shocks under rich rules vary considerably from responses where only non-distortionary fiscal instruments finance debt. Third, in the short run, all fiscal instruments except labor taxes react strongly to debt, but long-run intertemporal financing comes from all components of the government’s budget constraint. Fourth, debt-financed fiscal shocks trigger long-lasting dynamics; short-run and long-run multipliers can differ markedly.     

MONETARY AND FISCAL POLICIES INTERACTION IN MONETARY UNIONS

In this paper, the literature on the interaction between monetary and fiscal policies in a monetary union is surveyed. By adopting the concept of symbiosis as a starting point, the paper highlights the importance of uncertainty, policy makers' preferences and targets. Then, the role of commitment to policy rules and coordination is addressed. The analysis also focuses on the importance of the data considered for the generation of the policy mix. As a final step, the paper discusses the main results in the literature on public debt management in a monetary union. All the reported theoretical results are then adopted to retrieve policy and institutional implications for the European Monetary Union.     

Fiscal Policy in the New Open Economy Macroeconomics and Prospects for Fiscal Policy Coordination

Abstract.  This paper reviews the literature on the effects of fiscal policy in new open economy macroeconomics (NOEM) models, complementing it with additional results that attempt to clarify the importance of the exchange rate regime (fixed or flexible) and of the type of policy (balanced budget or debt‐financed). Fixed exchange rates only seem to postpone the costs from the short to the long run, but the type of policy is crucial in determining the welfare impact of fiscal expansions. The paper also reviews the recent literature on fiscal policy coordination and shows that there is already some evidence that the gains from coordination in this area can be potentially large but draw attention to the need for reflecting more on the role of fiscal policy as a stabilization tool and on possible interactions between fiscal and monetary policy.     

Forecast in detail

The Chancellor had promised a “reset” of fiscal policy in the Autumn Statement and in some senses he delivered, with yet another new set of fiscal rules. However, the stimulus package was very modest and is unlikely to have a material impact on the outlook.     

Self-fulfilling deflations

What types of monetary and fiscal policy rules produce self-fulfilling deflationary paths that are monotonic and empirically relevant? This paper presents simple theoretical conditions that guarantee the existence of these paths in a general equilibrium model with sticky prices. These sufficient conditions are weak enough to be satisfied by most monetary and fiscal policy rules. A quantification of the model which combines a real shock à la Hayashi and Prescott (2002) with a simultaneous sunspot that deanchors inflation expectations matches the main empirical features of the Japanese deflationary process during the “lost decade”. The results also highlight the key role of the assumption about the anchoring of inflation expectations for the size of fiscal multipliers and, in general, for any policy analysis.     

Prudence and Pragmatism in the Fiscal Stance

In this article, Simon Price argues that the government is pursuing a remarkably conservative fiscal policy. Not only has demand management been left almost entirely to the MPC, but since 1997 spending has been held down while the overall tax burden has been raised. Consequently, the relative size of the national debt is declining at a rapid rate. There are rules that are intended to govern debt policy, but they are based on less sound principles than the government argues, and may be inconsistent. Oddly, despite the emphasis on these rules, the government has announced a path for spending that makes it clear that it is in fact planning not to follow them. The government may be planning to reduce the national debt at an excessive rate. This may make sense in the short run, but is more problematic in the medium to long term. This is not to say fiscal policy should be immediately relaxed; the current low levels of private sector saving may well justify a temporarily tight fiscal stance.     

中国财政政策规则及其体制稳定性分析

本文构建了内生捕捉我国财政政策体制变化的财政规则,并对产出缺口稳定动机和债务稳定动机反应进行了分析。基于马尔科夫转换财政政策反馈规则的实证估计表明,不同体制下,财政赤字与政府债务和产出缺口之间存在不同的政策反应关系;与基于不变参数识别的规则相比,体制转换财政规则能更好地追踪我国财政赤字的时间序列行为。这意味着,假定财政政策体制总是固定的货币政策规则研究以及基于不变财政体制框架VAR度量财政政策冲击高频率效应的实证研究都应慎重。     

Budget regimes and internal governance: considerations for the sustainability of fiscal policy

In a fiscal policy set-up with Ricardian equivalence and rational expectations, the decision-making of private agents is based on the knowledge that current deficits will be met with future tax increases or spending decreases. This view requires that the government's budget exhibit intertemporal balance, or that fiscal policy be sustainable. This paper examines the extent to which sustainability holds in the light of changes in the institutional structure of the budget process and changes in internal House governance rules. The results indicate that certain aspects of sustainability are related to the underlying institutional structure and governance of the budget process. The authors wish to thank the editors and three anonymous referees for their thoughtful comments and suggestions. All remaining errors remain our own.     

后发国家技术赶超中的财政政策研究述评

论文对后发国家技术赶超中财政政策的国内研究文献进行了梳理。三个视角的研究文献遵循提出问题、分析问题和解决问题的逻辑线索,取得了初步的研究成果,构成了后发国家技术赶超中的财政政策研究基本框架,后续研究可以遵循这个框架和线索,在这三个领域继续进行拓展和深化。     

Learning about fiscal policy and the effects of policy uncertainty

In this paper we ask how uncertainty about fiscal policy affects the impact of fiscal policy changes on the economy when the government tries to counteract a deep recession. The agents in our model are uncertain about the conduct of fiscal policy and act as econometricians by estimating fiscal policy rules that might change over time.We find that assuming that agents are not instantaneously aware of the new fiscal policy regime in place leads to substantially more volatility in the short run and persistent differences in average outcomes. We highlight issues that can arise when a policymaker wants to announce a policy change. From a methodological perspective, we introduce a novel way to model learning in the face of discrete policy changes.     

Fiscal Policy and Economic Growth

This paper surveys the literature on fiscal policy and economic growth. We present a unifying framework for the analysis of long run growth implications of government expenditures and revenues. We find that several tax rates and expenditure categories exhibit a direct impact on the growth rate of the economy. In a creative synthesis we have assigned the relevant literature to the twelve introduced policy variables. Due to the equivalence of some policy variables we are left with six degrees of freedom, where we need four to internalize the model's intrinsic externalities, leaving two instruments to conduct short run fiscal policy.     

REAL‐TIME DATA AND FISCAL POLICY ANALYSIS: A SURVEY OF THE LITERATURE

This paper surveys the empirical research on fiscal policy analysis based on real‐time data. This literature can be broadly divided into four groups that focus on: (1) the statistical properties of revisions in fiscal data; (2) the political and institutional determinants of projection errors by governments; (3) the reaction of fiscal policies to the business cycle and (4) the use of real‐time fiscal data in structural vector autoregression (VAR) models. It emerges that, first, fiscal revisions are large and initial releases are biased estimates of final values. Secondly, strong fiscal rules and institutions lead to more accurate releases of fiscal data and smaller deviations of fiscal outcomes from government plans. Thirdly, the cyclical stance of fiscal policies is estimated to be more ‘counter‐cyclical’ when real‐time data are used instead of ex post data. Fourthly, real‐time data can be useful for the identification of fiscal shocks. Finally, it is shown that existing real‐time fiscal data sets cover only a limited number of countries and variables. For example, real‐time data for developing countries are generally unavailable. In addition, real‐time data on European countries are often missing, especially with respect to government revenues and expenditures. Therefore, more work is needed in this field.     

Fiscal and monetary policies in complex evolving economies

What is the most appropriate combination of fiscal and monetary policies in economies subject to banking crises and deep recessions? We study this issue using an agent-based model that is able to reproduce a wide array of macro- and micro-empirical regularities. Simulation results suggest that policy mixes associating unconstrained, counter-cyclical fiscal policy and monetary policy targeting employment is required to stabilise the economy. We also show that “discipline-guided” fiscal rules can be self-defeating, as they depress the economy without improving public finances. Finally, we find that the effects of monetary and fiscal policies become sharper as the level of income inequality increases.     

Fiscal News, State Budget Rules, and Tax-Exempt Bond Yields

This paper investigates how state fiscal institutions such as balanced-budget rules and restrictions on state debt issuance mediate the bond market reaction to state fiscal news. We analyze data on the yields of bonds issued by different states, as reported in the “Chubb Relative Value Survey,” along with data on state budget forecasts for the period 1988–1998. We find that unexpected deficits are correlated with higher state bond yields. This effect is smaller for states with tight antideficit rules than for states without these fiscal rules. Unexpected deficits have a particularly large effect in raising bond yields of states with tax limits. These results suggest that bond market participants view fiscal institutions as relevant in assessing the risk characteristics of tax-exempt bonds and that the economic significance of these institutions depends on the state's economic and fiscal circumstances.     

Commodity prices and fiscal policy design: Procyclical despite a rule

Recent studies offer evidence of reduced fiscal procyclicality to commodity price changes in resource‐rich countries—a feature commonly attributed to the adoption of fiscal policy rules. We revisit this issue and find that, by controlling for global activity shocks while allowing for time‐varying changes in both fiscal policy and the volatility of shocks, this finding does not hold. To show this we develop a time‐varying dynamic factor model, allowing for a multiple of shocks, stochastic volatility and time‐varying parameters, and estimate it on data for Norway, whose handling of resource wealth is often cited as exemplary.     

Alternative monetary policies and fiscal regime in new EU members

I investigate the relevance of a fiscal regime for disinflation in new EU member states (NMS). I generalize the framework of [Obstfeld, M., Rogoff, K., 1995. Exchange rate dynamics redux. Journal of Political Economy 103, 624–660] to incorporate the non-Ricardian fiscal regime and two monetary feedback rules: inflation targeting and depreciation targeting. Euro accession requires disinflation and stabilization of the exchange rate and thus restrictive monetary policy. The model illustrates that a sustainable and prudent fiscal policy is a necessary condition for successful stabilization of inflation. Thus, the lack of prudent fiscal policy, through its effects on inflation, may undermine the EMU accession of large NMS even when their fiscal outcomes fall within the Maastricht range.     

Fiscal Rules and Financial Systems: Complements or Substitutes?

We study the effect of fiscal rules on a country's credit rating and their interaction with financial development. We build a rich set of panel data, which includes a novel index for the strength of fiscal rules. We find a positive and significant effect of fiscal rules on sovereign ratings. We also find that this effect is attenuated in economies with a more developed domestic financial system. Therefore, financial markets act as a substitute for fiscal rules in lowering the default risk assessed by credit rating agencies. This substitution effect between fiscal rules and financial development is mostly triggered through the monitoring and enforcement dimension of fiscal rules.     

No Plan B: But is There a ‘Third Way'?

This paper reviews the argument for a slowdown in the fiscal consolidation policy of the UK government. It reviews the existing literature and the evidence of the interwar period in the UK where a recovery occurred without a relaxation of the tight fiscal regime of the period. It argues that even in a zero‐lower‐bound, the evidence for a plan B is weak. Given that there may have been significant capacity destruction, the paper suggests a third way that calls for a supply‐side framework that sets the condition for an improvement in long‐term growth and productivity.     

我国货币财政政策存在区域效应的实证分析

货币财政政策是现代国家干预经济的两个最重要的宏观调控政策，关于它们的研究文献数不胜数，但是长期以来一直没有对两政策实施后的区域效应给予足够的重视。本文结合目前我国东中西三大经济地带的经济发展已经存在明显差距的现实，通过两地区的简约化模型对1978-2004年间我国货币政策与财政政策在东部和中西部两个样本地区的作用进行了实证分析，结果表明，我国货币财政政策确实存在区域不对称效应，特别是货币政策，具有明显的区域影响差异。