The Performance of Simple Fiscal Policy Rules in Monetary Union

The paper analyses the stabilising potential of simple fiscal policy rules for a small open economy in monetary union in a 2-region DSGE model with nominal and real rigidities. We consider simple fiscal instrument rules for government purchases, transfers, and consumption, labour and capital taxes in analogy to interest rate rules in monetary policy. The paper finds a dichotomy in the welfare effects of fiscal policy for liquidity-constrained and intertemporal optimising households, i.e. policies enhancing the welfare of one group tend to reduce the welfare of the other one. The moderate average welfare gains from optimal policy contrast with potentially large welfare losses from non-optimal policy. Fiscal rules that respond to employment fluctuations may be preferred to fiscal rules responding to indicators of price competitiveness, because optimal policy corresponds more closely to the idea of countercyclical stabilisation in the former case. The simulations also emphasise the crucial impact of the budgetary closure rule on the welfare consequences of fiscal business-cycle stabilisation.     

Tracking the causes of eurozone external imbalances: new evidence and some policy implications

The paper assesses the contribution of key drivers of external imbalances in the Eurozone through the estimation of a panel-data Vector Autoregressive model over 1975–2011. Growth fluctuations, initially associated with demand booms triggered by unusually low interest rates, and later with demand contractions resulting from the crisis and policy adjustments, have played an important role in current account balance fluctuations. Changes in real exchange rates or unit labor costs have played a less important role. Demand shocks have contributed more to current account balance dynamics in the Eurozone periphery than in the core, whereas competitiveness has been a less prominent factor in the periphery but relatively more important in the core. Some broad policy implications of the findings for demand management in a currency union are discussed, including for fiscal policy coordination and macroprudential policies when union members face asymmetric shocks. The role of internal devaluation policies as a means of correcting external imbalances is also reassessed.     

How China Could Contribute to a Benign Global Rebalancing？

Our study shows that China could contribute to an orderly global rebalancing using a package of policies to stimulate its domestic consumption. These policies include a progressive appreciation of the RMB, fiscal stimulation by increasing expenditure on education, health care, social safety nets and poverty reduction, income policies to reduce inequality and to strengthen wage income, and reforms of the financial system to improve financial efficiency and to mitigate financial constraints. By implementing such policies, China＇ s external surplus could be narrowed and its domestic imbalances improved. The excessively high savings rate could be lowered and the share of household consumption increased, even though GDP growth would moderate slightly.     

Provincial fiscal positions and business cylce synchronization across China

This paper examines to what extent Chinese provinces with similar fiscal policies have synchronous business cycles. Following Darvas, Rose, and Szapáry (2007), we create a measure of fiscal policy divergence between provinces i and j and see if it is associated with the correlation of output movements between i and j. To examine this relation, we use the correlation model of Frankel and Rose (1998). Since causation can run from both fiscal policy to output fluctuations and from output fluctuations to fiscal policy, we instrument for fiscal policy using government expenditure on cultural activities which remains steady across the business cycle. Results show that provinces with similar budgetary positions tend to have similar business cycle movements.     

Imperfect Competition and Fiscal Policy Transmission in a Two-Country Economy

This paper explores the interactions between countries implementing a fiscal policy in a monopolistic competition framework. The study of the fiscal multipliers shows that a fiscal expansion in the home country increases domestic output and diminishes foreign output in the short run. Profit redistribution to households constitutes the main channel of transmission. Both influence of the proportion of domestic firms owned by domestic households and the effect of the mark-up on the transmission of government policies are analysed. In the long run there is no interaction between countries since profits are zero. The welfare analysis reveals the possibility of positive externalities across countries, and the introduction of alternative taxation principles shows that the main results can be altered by the taxation scheme.     

Has Fiscal Federalism Worked for Macroeconomic Purposes？ The Chinese Experience 1994-2003

China＇s central government undertook major tax regime reform in 1994 that was characterized by fiscal federalism. In hindsight, this reform might be viewed as being more emphatic towards the revenue side than the expenditure side. The reform has resulted in certain success both for revenue shifting and inflation fighting purposes. However, the reform and its subsequent follow-ups have not addressed some fundamental issues pertaining to China＇s government finance system, such as the overhauling of the function of government finance and redrawing lines between the central and regional governments with regard to their fiscal responsibilities and duties. Moreover, fiscal federalism might have actually increased fiscal burden on the economy, especially on domestic sectors of the economy. However, coupled with enhanced policy support for China＇ s external development, fiscal federalism might have helped to further accelerate resource shifts toward the external sector, thus resulting in an unprecedented rapid expansion in China＇ s exports since the mid1990s.     

Fiscal devaluations: evidence using bilateral trade balance data

We study the effects of fiscal devaluations on the trade balances of European Union countries over the 2000–2014 period using bilateral trade balance data. This enables us to control for the coincidence of tax policy measures in different countries, which is an aspect left unconsidered in previous econometric studies. A fiscal devaluation consisting of a budget-neutral tax shift in the amount of 1% of gross domestic product (GDP) from employers’ social security contributions to value added tax leads to a short-term improvement of bilateral trade balance ranging between 0.3 and 0.6% of GDP. An extrapolation of our baseline estimate to the overall trade balance yields an impact of 4.3% of GDP for the whole sample, which is slightly higher than presented in previous empirical research. Applying extrapolation to the trade deficit countries in the euro area shows that these countries’ balance of trade with the rest of the euro area improves by only 0.75% of GDP. Thus, the magnitude of the fiscal devaluation impact on the trade balance varies significantly across countries, depending on their trade openness, among other potentially relevant factors.     

户籍门槛、发展型政府与人口城镇化政策——基于大中城市面板数据的经验研究

文章从制度变迁视角分析了户籍改革难以突破的原因,在发展主义理念的指引下,如果户籍改革对地方经济增长或财政收支产生负面影响,地方政府可能会拖延或阻碍改革进程。基于大中城市面板数据的实证研究显示,特大城市提高门槛对地方人均产出有正面影响,户籍改革动力最弱。其他城市虽然可以通过降低户籍门槛提高人均产出水平,但率先放开户籍制度可能引发流动人口大量涌入抵消政策效果,地方政府的户籍改革动力随着城市人口规模增长逐步下降。同时,户籍人口增长会带来财政支出的显著增加,为避免户籍化政策对财政支出产生压力,地方政府会通过户籍门槛对流动人口进行筛选,将对财政收入贡献较低或产生明显财政支出的群体排斥在户籍门槛之外。本文认为中国大中城市的户籍制度存在刚性,可以通过收回地方制定落户政策的权力强制推动户籍制度改革,或利用财政政策降低户籍化成本,激励地方政府推动改革。     

Deciding to Peg the Exchange Rate in Developing Countries: The Role of Private-Sector Debt

We argue that a higher share of the private sector in a country’s external debt raises the incentive to stabilize the exchange rate. We present a simple model in which exchange rate volatility does not affect agents’ welfare if all the debt is incurred by the government. Once we introduce private banks who borrow in foreign currency and lend to domestic firms, the monetary authority has an incentive to dampen the distributional consequences of exchange rate fluctuations. Our empirical results support the hypothesis that not only the level, but also the composition of foreign debt matters for exchange-rate policy.     

Fiscal sustainability and solvency: theory and recent experience in Indonesia

A major challenge for Indonesian economic policy makers is to avoid the recurrence of conditions that could trigger a new economic crisis. One of the important dimensions of this challenge will be to conduct fiscal policy in a way that is sustainable, given the level of interest rates and the rate of growth of the economy. This paper synthesises various approaches to the measurement of fiscal sustainability that have appeared in the economic literature, relates these measures to the fundamental concept of fiscal solvency, and applies the framework to Indonesia over the period 1991–2003. The domestic and foreign debt positions of the central government are treated separately, to capture the influence of exchange rate changes on the relative costs of domestic and foreign borrowing. The empirical analysis indicates that Indonesia has met the fiscal sustainability criterion in recent years, except when the rupiah has depreciated heavily.     

我国中央政府财政政策资源合理利用途径博弈研究

本文以博弈论中的"公共地的悲剧"模型为基础,以地方政府逐渐增长的财政政策资源需求与中央政府有限的财政政策资源之间的矛盾为出发点,分析了我国中央财政政策资源不足与财政政策实施效果不理想的成因,从经济学角度阐述产生财政政策资源不足的根源,主张提高地方政府对于中央财政政策资源的使用成本,减少中央财政政策资源的公共物品性质,保证中央政策资源的合理利用。     

中国需求结构失衡:现状、度量及调整

本文首先介绍了我国需求结构的内外需失衡、消费投资失衡、居民消费和政府消费失衡的现状,然后从三大失衡入手构建我国的需求结构失衡指数。研究表明,从中国需求结构失衡的权重来看,内外需结构失衡的权重最大,历年均超过40%。从不考虑权重的失衡指数来看,我国需求结构失衡主要是消费和投资的失衡;从考虑权重构建的需求结构失衡指数来看,消费和投资的失衡仍旧构成了需求结构失衡的主要部分,且需求结构出现过两次大的失衡高峰期,第一次是1993年前后,第二次是2000年以来。最后结合中国实际和本文结论,提出了相应的政策建议。     

Absence of safe assets and fiscal crisis

This paper develops a fiscal crisis model that explains a mechanism under which low interest rates can coexist with Japan's large outstanding debt. The key idea is that when there is a strong home bias in the asset portfolio of domestic bondholders, these investors turn out to have no access to any assets that hedge fiscal risk. This explains why domestic investors do not request a risk premium on government bonds. In this environment, the interest rate and the default probability are low, and the government can sustain its large debt even under adverse fiscal conditions. As the interest rate does not rise fully to reflect the risk premium, the low interest rate is not always a signal of sound fiscal conditions. The welfare implications of financial market reform are mixed. This reform can improve welfare so long as the government can sustain the debt, but at the same time, it makes it difficult to sustain the debt because the interest rate rises. Quantitative easing is effective in lowering the risk premium.     

美国双缺口、对外债务与经济增长

对外债务显著扩张是当代美国经济外部失衡加剧的主要表现形式,但对外债务扩张的根本原因在于美国经济的内部失衡。对外债务的根本作用在于弥补美国政府部门财政缺口与私人部门储蓄-投资缺口。研究显示,在经济景气阶段,美国私人部门储蓄-投资缺口会扩大,工商企业会增加对外负债弥补储蓄-投资缺口;在经济衰退阶段,美国政府部门财政缺口会扩大,政府部门会增加对外负债弥补财政缺口。因此,无论美国经济景气还是衰退,其对外债务规模都在增加。考虑到美国经济对对外债务的强烈依赖性,我们有理由认为,未来美国的对外债务仍然会持续扩张。     

产业空洞化:野田政权面对的经济困局

"3·11"大地震之后,日本国内经济产业环境发生了重大变化:巨大震灾不仅使日本经济遭受重创,而且,还带来了供应链断裂、福岛核危机以及因核电停运而导致的电力紧张。这些新的问题又与内需不足、财政失衡、增长低迷等日本经济长期未能解决的"沉疴"交织在一起,导致日本国内经济产业环境急剧恶化。此外,严峻的全球经济形势更让日本经济雪上加霜:欧债危机、美国经济复苏乏力、新兴经济体增长减速,危机四伏的全球经济环境导致日元不断升值。在上述三重压力的打击之下,是否"离开日本",已经成为日本企业战略重构的关键,所以,日本政府正在面临史无前例的产业空洞化困局。     

Can exchange rate rules be better than interest rate rules?

We develop a New Keynesian small open economy model to compare the welfare performances of two classes of monetary policy rules: exchange rate rules and interest rate rules. The expected lifetime utility of the representative household is used as the welfare criterion. The model is solved using second-order approximation methods. We find that under benchmark parameterization, an exchange rate rule delivers lower standard deviations of GDP and inflation compared to an interest rate rule, when the economy has a high degree of openness. However, despite that, an exchange rate rule is welfare inferior to an interest rate rule since it delivers lower mean terms of trade, which leads to lower mean consumption and higher mean labor hours. On the other hand, when the elasticity of substitution for export is high, an exchange rate rule is welfare superior to an interest rate rule, regardless of the degree of openness, as the differences in mean terms of trade for the two classes of rules become smaller.     

生产性支出偏好与经济增长波动

文章基于我国1998-2006年的县级面板数据,分析财政支出结构对经济增长波动的影响机制。理论分析表明,我国地方政府偏好生产性支出的特点,将提高经济增长波动率;实证结果有力地论证了上述结论,即生产性公共支出占比提高10%,经济增长波动率将增加0.42%。稳健性分析发现中西部县级地区较东部地区经济增长的波动率更大。此外,我国生产性支出偏好对经济增长波动率的影响具有明显的顺周期特征,在繁荣时期,经济增长波动率的增加幅度将超过0.8%。文章的结论可为推进和完善中央与地方财政事权和支出责任划分提供参考和依据。     

The role of macroeconomic policy in rebalancing growth

The aftermath of the global financial crisis of 2007–2009 has called the export-led growth model of many Asian economies into question. This paper describes the contribution that macroeconomic policy can make to promote a rebalancing of growth away from dependence on exports to developed economies to a more sustainable pattern of growth centered on domestic and regional demand. This represents a significant departure from the traditional uses of macroeconomic policy to stabilize the economic cycle and achieve stable and low inflation. The evidence suggests that macroeconomic policy can successfully contribute to growth rebalancing. Policy measures not only can affect aggregate demand directly, but can also affect it indirectly via their “microeconomic” impacts on private sector behavior such as the household savings rate. Although in the long-term fiscal policy should be balanced to maintain government debt stability and avoid crowding out of private investment, there may be substantial scope to expand monetary and fiscal policy in the medium-term to offset the deflationary effects of an appreciating currency during periods of current account reversal. Previous experience suggests that most of the needed stimulus can be provided by monetary policy, with only a supplementary role to be played by fiscal policy. Moreover, Asian economies with large current account surpluses tend to have sufficient fiscal space.     

Economy of underconsumption

This paper studies the quantitative and qualitative indicators of nonfood consumption, house purchases, and the use of paid services on the basis of an analysis of domestic and external consumer resources, price levels, and household income differentiation.     

Fiscal policy and direct crowding-out in a small open economy

This paper analyses the welfare effects of fiscal policy in a small open economy, where private and government consumption are substitutes in terms of private utility. The main findings are as follows: fiscal policy raises output, bringing it closer to its efficient level, but is not welfare-improving even though government spending directly affects private utility. The main reason for this is that the introduction of useful government spending implies a larger crowding-out effect on private consumption, when compared with the ‘pure waste’ case. Utility decreases since one unit of government consumption yields less utility than one unit of private consumption. In any case, the marginal rate of substitution between private and government consumption is a key parameter in governing the welfare effects of fiscal policy.