Optimal Fiscal Policy Research Articles

Optimal fiscal policy in small open economies with habit persistence

Abstract This paper sets up a small open economy model with habit persistence in consumption in which distortionary taxation is available in a flexible price environment. In open economy, the habit persistence in consumption aggravates the terms of trade externality, absent in closed economy, calling for more aggressive fiscal policy. While optimal labor income taxes are time-invariant in a closed economy with internal habit, they should be time-varying in an open economy to alleviate the terms of trade externality, even if the intertemporal elasticity of substitution equals the intratemporal elasticity of substitution. In a small open economy composed of households with habit persistence in consumption, households’ decision to gradually adjust their consumption and labor hours intensifies the undesirable terms of trade externality or the terms of trade channel. This generates a time-varying wedge between the efficiency conditions of the Ramsey planner and the market equilibrium conditions, calling for a time-varying taxation which takes into account the intertemporal elasticity of substitution and the intratemporal elasticity of substitution between home and foreign goods, in addition to the degree of habit and goods market distortion. The volatility of optimal tax rate increases with the degree of habit, whether households have external or internal habit. The volatility of tax rate shows an inverted U-shape in the degree of openness in the small open economy with habit. Finally, the optimal labor income tax rate moves countercyclically for low degree of intratemporal elasticity of substitution, while it moves procyclically for high degree of intratemporal elasticity of substitution.

Optimal fiscal policy in times of uncertainty: a stochastic control approach

Optimal fiscal policy in times of uncertainty: a stochastic control approach

The Ramsey steady-state conundrum in heterogeneous-agent economies

This paper makes two fundamental contributions: (i) We prove that the interior Ramsey steady state commonly assumed in the literature may not exist in a standard Aiyagari model—in particular, a steady state with the modified golden rule and a positive capital tax is shown to be feasible but not optimal under conventional parameter values for the intertemporal elasticity of substitution. (ii) We design a modified, analytically tractable version of the standard Aiyagari model to reveal the necessary and/or sufficient conditions for the existence of a Ramsey steady state. We characterize the basic properties of both interior and non-interior Ramsey steady states and show that researchers may draw fundamentally misleading conclusions about optimal fiscal policy (such as the optimal capital tax rate) from their analysis if an interior Ramsey steady state is incorrectly assumed.

Optimal fiscal policy under finite planning horizons

We propose a novel framework that revisits the seminal Chamley-Judd zero capital taxation result in light of bounded rationality stemming from a finite policy planning horizon and structural frictions in fiscal institutions. We show a mechanism that generates positive optimal capital taxation in the long run. Our numerical results indicate that the current tax system in the United States could be near-optimal in a constrained environment where policymakers exhibit limited policy planning horizons and imperfect altruism toward household welfare under subsequent governments.

Global Dynamics and Optimal Policy in the Ak Model with Anticipated Future Consumption

Abstract This paper analyzes the Ak model with anticipated future consumption. In the model with internal anticipation individual’s utility depends on current consumption and a forward-looking reference level which is formed from individual’s own future consumption. The global dynamics of the economy is characterized by means of a qualitative phase diagram analysis. In the model with external anticipation the consumption reference level is formed from economy-wide average future consumption, which is taken as given by individuals and causes the competitive equilibrium to be inefficient. Characterizing the global dynamics of the economy is required to characterize an optimal fiscal policy that corrects the inefficiency brought about by this external effect.

Tax evasion, tax reward and the optimal fiscal policy

This theoretical paper studies the optimal fiscal policy in the presence of both pen- alties for tax evasion and rewards for tax compliance. Indeed, the presence of tax rewards changes the behaviour of firms and amplifies the role of the tax authority. In general, tax reward is able to reduce corporate tax evasion. However, the opti- mal fiscal policy depends on the fiscal scenario. Precisely, audit emerges as the main element of fiscal policy when tax evasion is widespread (negative scenario); whereas, in the positive fiscal scenario (where most people comply with tax rules), the range of fiscal policy choices is broader.

Optimal fiscal and monetary policy with collateral constraints

We study the Ramsey optimal fiscal and monetary policy in an economy where banks face collateral constraints. Inflation reduces the net worth of banks and tightens their collateral constraint by revaluing their nominal assets and liabilities. The optimal policy balances tax distortions with the costs of inflation on banks, thereby deviating from perfect tax smoothing. Our quantitative analysis reveals that inflation plays a much smaller role in financing fiscal needs in the optimal policy compared to existing literature. When considering price stickiness and long-term government debt, optimal inflation is modest and persistent, and the role of inflation in fiscal financing increases with the maturity of government debt.

Global shocks, budgets deficits, and international fiscal policy coordination

AbstractA simple two‐country model with trade, fiscal and interest rate externalities is used to study strategic interactions between national policymakers. Optimal fiscal policy internalizes a trade‐off between output stability and fiscal stability. With lump‐sum taxation, the noncooperative equilibrium is inefficient and both countries are better off under coordination. These results also hold if taxation is distortionary and trade generates a fiscal externality as well, regardless of how strong the preference for output stability is. In response to a negative global demand shock, consistent with the disruptions that occurred during the recent pandemic, the optimal policy response is to increase spending by more under cooperation. However, if budget deficits generate a sufficiently strong negative cross‐border externality through higher interest rates, the optimal response calls for lower spending under cooperation.

Dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic in Slovenia: simulations with a macroeconometric model

In this paper we analyse the effectiveness of fiscal policies with respect to macroeconomic stabilisation during the COVID-19 pandemic in the small open economy of Slovenia. Using SLOPOL11, an econometric model of the Slovenian economy, we simulate the development of the its economy during the 2020s under alternative assumptions about future pandemic-related shocks. We also determine optimal fiscal policies to combat the effects of the pandemic and to stabilise the economy under two scenarios for the future course of developments under COVID-19. Our simulations show that those public spending measures that entail both demand- and supply-side effects are more effective at stimulating real GDP and increasing employment than pure demand-side measures. Successful stabilisation policies should thus contain a supply-side component in addition to a demand-side component.

The interdependencies between the private and public sectors in open economies

Empirical evidence shows that countries with larger public sectors also have larger trade shares and a larger share of firms that export. These links between the public and the private sector are reconciled in an analytically tractable general equilibrium model allowing for a two-way causal relation between size (and the composition) of the public sector and openness and industry structure of the private sector. First, a larger public sector or a larger share of public expenditure used for public employment (alternative to transfers) results in a more open private sector (trade share and fraction of firms exporting), and it is also associated with more fat-tailedness of the firm size distribution, higher average productivity, lower average unit labour costs, and better wage competitiveness and terms of trade. These outcomes are driven by endogenous entry and selection of firms. Second, for optimal fiscal policies, international spillovers imply that non-cooperative policies have an upward bias in the overall size of the public sector, but a downward bias in transfers as a share of public expenditures. Trade liberalization and the degree of firm heterogeneity magnify these biases and thereby influence the size and structure of public expenditures.

A fiscal theory of money and bank liquidity provision

Fiscal-backed money can provide additional liquidity to consumers and mitigate the liquidity shortage problem in an economy with banks where agents face idiosyncratic liquidity shocks without being fully insured. The government issues fiat money and creates real value for money by levying a tax and accepting money for tax payments. Tax reallocates the distribution of liquidity in the economy. An increase in tax, by increasing fiscal surplus and the real value of money, reduces the equilibrium investment. Additionally, imposing taxes influences the incentive of private information production, which may impose a constraint on optimal fiscal policy.

Commodity prices and business cycles in small open economies: the role of news shocks

PurposeThe authors explore the hypothesis that some movements in commodity prices are anticipated (news shocks) and can trigger aggregate fluctuations in small open emerging economies. This paper aims to discuss the aforementioned objective.Design/methodology/approachThe authors build a multi-sector dynamic stochastic general equilibrium model with endogenous commodity production. There are five exogenous processes: a country-specific interest rate shock that responds to commodity price fluctuations, a productivity (TFP) shock for each sector and a commodity price shock. Both TFP and commodity price shocks are composed of unanticipated and anticipated components.FindingsThe authors show that news shocks to commodity prices lead to higher output, investment and consumption, and a countercyclical movement in the trade-balance-to-output ratio. The authors also show that commodity price news shocks explain about 24% of output aggregate fluctuations in the small open economy.Practical implicationsGiven the importance of both anticipated and unanticipated commodity price shocks, policymakers should pay attention to developments in commodity markets when designing policies to attenuate the business cycles. Future research should investigate the design of optimal fiscal and monetary policies in SOE subject to news shocks in commodity prices.Originality/valueThis paper contributes to the knowledge of the sources of fluctuations in emerging economies highlighting the importance of a new source: news shocks in commodity prices.

Optimal fiscal and monetary policy in a model with government corruption

This paper builds a theoretical model where corrupt government officials select the optimal amount of government spending directed toward building wealth for themselves and political allies. We refer to this type of government expenditures as rent extraction spending. Our results show that more government corruption leads to higher rent extraction spending, increased inflation, additional taxation, and lower non-rent extraction spending. The increases in inflation and rent extraction spending, however, are more muted when the corrupt country is a member of a currency union.

Optimal fiscal policy under monopolistic competition with firm heterogeneity

AbstractGovernment spending is a policy instrument used to sustain economic development and improve social welfare. Empirical observations, however, reveal a significant decrease in the government spending to GDP ratio for the United States. In addition, the United States has been observed to exhibit a rise in firm heterogeneity in productivity in recent decades. This paper shows that the optimal size of government expenditure will decrease as firm heterogeneity increases. We thus indicate that the rise in firm heterogeneity in productivity may serve as a plausible vehicle to explain the decline in the share of government spending in GDP for the United States.

Pareto-Improving Optimal Capital and Labor Taxes

We study optimal fiscal policy in a model with agents who are heterogeneous in their labor productivity and wealth, and there is an upper bound on the capital tax rate each period. We focus on Pareto-improving plans. We show that the optimal tax reform is to cut labor taxes and leave capital taxes high in the short and medium run. Only in the very long run would capital taxes be zero. For our calibration labor taxes should be low for the first eleven to twenty-six years, while capital taxes should be at their maximum. This policy ensures that all agents benefit from the tax reform and that capital grows quickly after the reform. Therefore, the long-run optimal tax mix is the opposite of the short- and medium-run one. The initial labor tax cut is financed by deficits, which lead to a positive level of government debt in the long run, reversing the standard prediction that the government accumulates savings in models with optimal capital taxes. The welfare benefits from the tax reform are high and can be shifted entirely to capitalists or workers by varying the length of the transition.

Fiscal policy and economic growth in the short and long run: a literature review

The purpose of this paper is to establish the main channels of fiscal policy impact on economic growth and to identify problems or missing aspects in the analysis. The paper summarizes the impact of fiscal policy on economic growth in the long-run and short-run on the basis of extensive (82 sources) literature analysis. The paper analyzes the results of theoretical and empirical studies. The paper pays attention to the comparison of empirical results for poor and rich countries, as the optimal fiscal policy may differ significantly from country to country. On the theoretical side, the paper mainly focuses on endogenous growth models, but also touches on overlapping generations and Solow models. Special attention is paid to the estimation of fiscal multipliers. Through a broad view, the paper touches upon the main instruments of fiscal policy and their impact on economic growth both in the short run and in the long run. The author's contribution is in overview of a wide body of literature on fiscal policy, which helps to identify the main problems in analyzing the impact of fiscal policy. Fiscal policy can have short- and long-term effects on economic growth through changing the incentives of economic agents, through reducing transaction costs between them, and through influencing expectations. However, the main body of empirical literature examines the impact of fiscal policy on economic growth in developed countries. This poses a challenge for fiscal policy in developing countries, as recommendations derived from the experience of developed countries are often suboptimal for developing countries. The article also points out the significant problems associated with empirical analysis of the performance of fiscal policy even in developed countries.

Optimal macroprudential and fiscal policy in a monetary union

The link between the financial system, economic activity, and fiscal sustainability is increasingly evident, making the joint study of fiscal and macroprudential measures a promising area to investigate. This paper provides a novel analysis of the coordination of optimal fiscal and macroprudential policies regarding welfare maximization through a two-country model for a monetary union. I find that the advisability to coordinate macroprudential and fiscal policy depends on the kind of shock that hits the economy. After financial shocks, macroprudential-fiscal coordination at the national level entails the greatest welfare improvements. Under supply and demand shocks, the best option regarding welfare implies macroprudential-fiscal coordination to stabilize union aggregate variables.

Optimal fiscal policy in incomplete market business cycle economies

In this paper, we study how a government should set its fiscal instruments in order to provide insurance to individuals and deal with inequality. We quantitatively evaluate the role of public debt and its interaction with progressive income taxation. To guide our assessment, we develop a DSGE model with incomplete markets that embeds two empirical relevant features that have not been considered by the literature: cyclical idiosyncratic risk and the extensive margin of labor supply. We calibrate the model to be consistent with the micro and macro evidence for the US economy. We study the importance of time-varying idiosyncratic risk and labor supply elasticity in determining optimal policies by considering two nested versions of the model that shut down one feature at a time. We find that considering both ingredients together significantly increases the optimal debt to output ratio. In addition, we show that the model generates a positive relationship between public debt and income tax progressivity, consistent to what is observed in the data.

Doubts about the model and optimal policy

This paper analyzes optimal policy in setups where both the policymaker and the private sector have doubts about the probability model of uncertainty and form endogenous worst-case beliefs. There are two forces that shape optimal policy results: a) the manipulation of the endogenous beliefs of the private sector so that the forward-looking constraints that the policymaker is facing are relaxed, b) the discrepancy (if any) in pessimistic beliefs between a paternalistic policymaker and the private sector, which captures ultimately differences in welfare evaluation. I illustrate the methodology in an optimal fiscal policy problem and show that manipulation of beliefs materializes as an effort to make government debt cheaper through the endogenous beliefs of the household. This force may lead to either mitigation or amplification of the household's pessimism, depending on the problem's parameters. The policymaker's relative pessimism determines whether paternalism reinforces or opposes the price manipulation incentives.

Fiscal multipliers and structural economic characteristics: Evidence from countries in sub‐Saharan Africa

AbstractOutput response to discretionary fiscal policy is a key aspect of examining various theories, findings of empirical studies and delivering guidance to policymakers. This study analyses the output response to unanticipated fiscal spending shocks under several structural economic characteristic factors, including business cycle states, debt burden, openness of the economy, exchange rate regimes and political governance regime, using annual data from 40 countries in SSA spanning from 2000 to 2019 in a panel threshold vector auto‐regression model. The findings indicate that fiscal spending multipliers have much larger effects on output in times of recession, in economies operating under lower trade openness, a fixed exchange rate, low‐debt burden, restricted capital mobility, less financial development and a democratic governance regime. Based on the results, the discretionary countercyclical fiscal policy and optimal fiscal policy action are recommended. Moreover, in order to have effective fiscal policy must target hand‐to‐mouth consumers (non‐Ricardian consumers) and firms with limited liquidity, concentrating on social services and social protection to increase short‐term demand. Likewise, A proper fiscal monetary policy mix should be considered with other structural measures to maximising the positive effects of the fiscal expansion.