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Fiscal Policy in Debt Constrained Economies
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Fiscal Policy in Debt Constrained Economies

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  • Mark Aguiar
  • Manuel Amador

Abstract

We study optimal fiscal policy in a small open economy (SOE) with sovereign and private default risk and limited commitment to tax plans. The SOE's government uses linear taxation to fund exogenous expenditures and uses public debt to inter-temporally allocate tax distortions. We characterize a class of environments in which the tax on labor goes to zero in the long run, while the tax on capital income may be non-zero, reversing the standard prediction of the Ramsey tax literature. The zero labor tax is an optimal long run outcome if the economy is subject to sovereign debt constraints and the domestic households are impatient relative to the international interest rate. The front loading of tax distortions allows the economy to build a large (aggregate) debt position in the presence of limited commitment. We show that a similar result holds in a closed economy with imperfect inter-generational altruism, providing a link with the closed-economy literature that has explored disagreement between the government and its citizens regarding inter-temporal tradeoffs.

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  • Mark Aguiar & Manuel Amador, 2015. "Fiscal Policy in Debt Constrained Economies," Staff Report 518, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis.
    • Handle: RePEc:fip:fedmsr:518
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    4. Pablo D'Erasmo & Enrique Mendoza, 2011. "Optimal Domestic (and External) Sovereign Default," PIER Working Paper Archive 16-019, Penn Institute for Economic Research, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania, revised 04 Aug 2016.
    5. Marina Azzimonti & Vincenzo Quadrini, 2024. "International Spillovers and Bailouts," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 91(1), pages 77-128.
    6. TRANDAFIR, Adina & NEGURIȚĂ, Octav & GUNI, Claudia, 2018. "The Impact Of Deflation On Fiscal Aggregates," Annals of Spiru Haret University, Economic Series, Universitatea Spiru Haret, vol. 18(3), pages 81-96.
    7. Lee E. Ohanian & Paulina Restrepo-Echavarria & Mark L. J. Wright, 2018. "Bad Investments and Missed Opportunities? Postwar Capital Flows to Asia and Latin America," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 108(12), pages 3541-3582, December.
    8. Richard Dennis, 2013. "Asset Prices, Business Cycles, and Markov-Perfect Fiscal Policy when Agents are Risk-Sensitive," CAMA Working Papers 2013-69, Centre for Applied Macroeconomic Analysis, Crawford School of Public Policy, The Australian National University.
    9. Biljanovska, Nina & Vardoulakis, Alexandros P., 2019. "Capital taxation with heterogeneous discounting and collateralized borrowing," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 60(C), pages 97-109.
    10. Tran-Xuan, Monica, 2023. "Optimal redistributive policy in debt constrained economies," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 144(C).
    11. Ali, Amjad, 2022. "Determining Pakistan's Financial Dependency: The Role of Financial Globalization and Corruption," MPRA Paper 116097, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    12. Barseghyan, Levon & Battaglini, Marco, 2016. "Political economy of debt and growth," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 82(C), pages 36-51.
    13. Bauducco, Sofia & Caprioli, Francesco, 2014. "Optimal fiscal policy in a small open economy with limited commitment," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 93(2), pages 302-315.
    14. Lee Ohanian & Diana Van Patten & Mark Wright & Paulina Restrepo-Echavarria, 2019. "Bretton Woods and the Reconstruction of Europe," 2019 Meeting Papers 665, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    15. Lee E. Ohanian & Paulina Restrepo-Echavarria & Diana Van Patten & Mark L. J. Wright, 2020. "The Impact of Bretton Woods International Capital Controls on the Global Economy and the Value of Geopolitical Stability: A General Equilibrium Analysis," Working Papers 2020-042, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, revised 19 Sep 2024.
    16. Braun, R. Anton & Joines, Douglas H., 2015. "The implications of a graying Japan for government policy," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 57(C), pages 1-23.
    17. Das, Debasish Kumar, 2012. "Determinants of current account imbalances in the global economy: A dynamic panel analysis," MPRA Paper 42419, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    18. Michael Kumhof & Irina Yakadina, 2017. "Government Debt Bias," IMF Economic Review, Palgrave Macmillan;International Monetary Fund, vol. 65(4), pages 675-703, November.
    19. Marina Azzimonti & Vincenzo Quadrini, 2019. "International spillovers and `ex-ante' efficient bailouts," 2019 Meeting Papers 318, Society for Economic Dynamics.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Sovereign debt; Limited commitment; Fiscal policy;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • F32 - International Economics - - International Finance - - - Current Account Adjustment; Short-term Capital Movements
    • E62 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Macroeconomic Policy, Macroeconomic Aspects of Public Finance, and General Outlook - - - Fiscal Policy; Modern Monetary Theory
    • F34 - International Economics - - International Finance - - - International Lending and Debt Problems
    • F38 - International Economics - - International Finance - - - International Financial Policy: Financial Transactions Tax; Capital Controls

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