The Role of Fiscal Policy in an Incomplete Markets Framework.

A general-equilibrium model is developed to highlight the link between neo-Keynesian models of unemployment and recent results on the constrained suboptimality of competitive economies with incomplete asset markets. Although the model deviates from the Arrow-Debreu paradigm only by the absence of some contingent claims, the competitive equilibrium exhibits underemployment and balanced-budget fiscal policies have Keynesian effects that are Pareto improving. Copyright 1995 by The Review of Economic Studies Limited.