This paper proposes a fiscal policy framework we call Public Debt Targeting. The framework seeks to smooth primary spending over the business cycle while remaining consistent with public debt sustainability. Under the proposed framework, a government announces a commitment to a public debt band...

This paper evaluates whether the 2011 national stability programs (SPs) of the euro area countries are instrumental in achieving economic stability in the European Monetary Union (EMU). In particular, we analyze how the SPs address the double challenge of public deficits and external imbalances....

The current recession has highlighted the potentially severe impact of shrinkages in demand and fiscal austerity upon firm entry and survival. Using data covering broad manufacturing and service sectors in 17 countries this paper investigates how changes in fiscal policy and market size affect...

This paper surveys the empirical research on fiscal policy analysis based on real-time data. This literature can be broadly divided in three groups that focus on: (1) the statistical properties of revisions in fiscal data; (2) the political and institutional determinants of projection errors by...

This essay examines the trajectory of India?s fiscal policy with a focus on historical trends, fiscal discipline frameworks, fiscal responses to the global financial crisis and subsequent return to a fiscal consolidation path. [Ministry of Finance WP]....

In the past decade the Colombian Economic Authorities undertook a series of measures that reduced the structural fiscal deficit, decreased the Government currency mismatch and deepened the local fixed-rate public bond market. This paper presents some evidence suggesting that these improvements...

We examine the relationship between federal transfers, the existence of a wage premium for the public sector and its effects on private wages in Argentina. The empirical analysis is based on the theoretical presumption that federal fiscal transfers to the different regions are being used to...

Ireland’s Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the EU/IMF requires government to introduce a recurring annual property tax. While the MoU has not specified the precise form this new taxation measure will adopt, commitments in the National Recovery Plan 2011-2014 and Fine Gael/Labour...

This paper studies whether in Pakistan the dynamic behavior of unemployment, inflation, budget deficit and real GDP growth is systematically affected by the timing of elections. We cover the period from 1973-2009. Our results can be summarized as follows: 1. Unemployment tends to be lower in...